Revisionary History Of Santa C Essay, Research Paper

DDiscipline is defined in the dictionary as a strict control to enforce obedience and/or a treatment that corrects or punishes (Webster s New World Dictionary). In the seventeenth century strict discipline was believed to be an art of correct training (Foucault 170). Through this rigorous technique, individuals were created as objects and instruments. Disciplinary power derives from three instruments: hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment and the examination. The technique of correct training is apparent in our everyday lifestyles. The popular Christmas jingle, Santa Claus is Coming to Town is an example of how something most people are familiar with can be related to hierarchical observation, normalizing judgment and the examination.

Santa Claus, father of Christmas, was depicted as a tall, dignified religious figure riding a white horse through the air. He identified with Santa Nicholas, children s friend. It was believed that accompanying Santa Claus was Black Peter, an elf who punished disobedient children. Eventually as the years elapsed Santa Claus developed into a chubby, jolly old gentleman who drives a sleigh pulled-reindeer and who had neither the religious character of Saint Nicholas nor the strict disciplinary character of Black Peter. As time elapsed candy canes, Christmas trees, gifts and Christmas carols/ jingles, replaced the true meaning of Christmas. A Christmas carol/jingle that is associated with Santa Claus is Santa Claus is Coming To Town.

This popular Christmas jingle is meant to make children enthusiastic about Christmas but also warn them of the consequences of being naughty instead of nice (Encarta Encyclopedia).

Normalizing judgment involves the limits of accepting correct behavior, whether it be a parent or society setting those limits. The ones who adhere to the rules or limits are then rewarded, but those who do not comply are treated unequally, looked upon and receive nothing but sorrow. In sense, the power of normalization imposes homogeneity; but it individualizes by making it possible to measure gaps, to determine levels, to fix specialties and to render the determine useful by fitting them one to another (184). Normalizing judgment is present in the first phrase of popular Christmas jingle: You better watch out/ You better not cry/ Better not pout/I m telling you why/Santa Claus is coming to town. It indicates that good disciplined and well behaved children will be rewarded materially but at the same time illustrates that a child who does not demonstrate correct behavior shall receive nothing.

Examination is a highly ritualized method by which a person is being looked at critically or methodically. The examination identifies, evaluates and classifies an individual in accordance with another person s standards. It is the examination which, by combining hierarchical surveillance and normalizing judgment, assures the great disciplinary functions of distribution and classification, maximum extraction of faces and time, continuous genetic and combinatory individuality (192). The examination technique is evident in jingle: He s making a list/And checking it twice/Gonna find out who s naughty and nice/Santa Claus is coming to town. This phrase clearly indicates that Santa Claus is consistently watching and using his power of judgment. Foulcault states: a penal accountancy, constantly brought up to date, makes it possible to obtain the punitive balance-sheet of each individual (180). Santa Claus uses the examination technique and his personal criteria of appropriate behavior to separate the good from the bad.

The exercise of discipline presupposes a mechanism that coerces by means of observation; an apparatus in which the techniques that make it possible to see effects of power, and in which, conversely, the means of coercion make those on whom they are applied clearly visible (171). Hierarchical observation makes it possible to see induced effects of power and is present in the popular Christmas jingle: He sees you when you re sleeping/He knows when you re awake/He knows if you ve been bad or good/So be good for goodness sake!

Foucault states: the perfect disciplinary apparatus would make it possible for a single gaze to see everything constantly (173). The idea that Santa Claus is all knowing and all-seeing at all times places him into a disciplinarian position.

Santa Claus is Coming to Town is a jolly Christmas jingle with double meaning. In discipline, punishment is only one element of a double system: gratification punishment (180). This jingle is used as a disciplinary apparatus for children. Santa Claus is Coming to Town gives the disciplinary implication that Santa Claus plays a role in the means of correct training in children s lives. The Christmas jingle is composed of normalizing judgment, examination, and hierarchical observation.

Work Cited

Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Trans. Alan Sheridan.

New York: Vintage Books, 1977.

Santa Claus Is Coming To Town! 01 Nov. 1998. 27 Mar. 2001. .

Santa Claus. Encarata Encyclopedia. 3rd ed. 1999.

Macmillan. Discipline. Webster s New World Dictionary. 1996.