Foucauldian Power and Identity in John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath
Journal Title: International Research Journal of Applied and Basic Sciences - Year 2014, Vol 8, Issue 11
Abstract
Power relation and identity have always been the matter of debates in literature. Althusser, the Marxist critic and thinker, believes that power is possessed by the powerful; consequently, the less powerful are nothing but puppets that are doomed to accept the wills of the system and the institutions. Rejecting this theory, Michel Foucault, the French critic, asserts that power is not something to be held or possessed by the governments, systems and institutions since it is not something fixed and stable. On the contrary, power in power relation is dynamic and for this reason it can be productive. This view of power relation can neither be negative nor result in repression. In fact, it exists wherever there is resistance and it exists in every kind of relation, so it can be positive and productive. According to this theory each individual, in turn, would not have a fixed identity, for the power is volatile, an unstable element which can always be contested. To study John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath under the light of Foucauldian theory of power, firstly two characters, Tom Joad who is just released from prison and Jim Casy, the ex-preacher are selected. These two characters’ resistance against the system in the power relation is studied focusing on Foucault’s theory of power. In the next step, it is tried to show whether the Foucauldian concept of the resistance ultimately leads to productivity as he predicts or not, and finally the effects of the power relation on the two mentioned characters’ identity is studied.
Authors and Affiliations
Abdolreza Goudarzi| Ph. D. Student of English Literature, Department of English, Alborz Campus, University of Tehran, email: a.rezagoudarzi@yahoo.com, Dr. Zohreh Ramin| Department of English, University of Tehran, Iran
Keywords
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