Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)
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| :''[[Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)]]'' | :''[[Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)]]'' | ||
| - | The '''Panopticon''' is a type of [[prison]] building designed by English philosopher and social theorist [[Jeremy Bentham]] in 1785. The concept of the design is to allow an observer to observe (''-opticon'') all (''pan-'') prisoners without the prisoners being able to tell whether they are being watched, thereby conveying what one architect has called the "sentiment of an invisible [[omniscience]]." | ||
| - | Bentham himself described the Panopticon as "a new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example." | + | '''Big Brother''' is a [[fictional character]] in [[George Orwell]]'s novel ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'', the [[wiktionary:enigmatic|enigmatic]] [[dictator]] of [[Oceania (1984)|Oceania]], a [[Totalitarianism|totalitarian]] state taken to its utmost logical consequence - where the ruling elite ('the Party') wield total power for its own sake over the inhabitants. |
| - | It was among [[Jeremy Bentham]] many proposals for legal and [[social reform]]. Although it was never built, the idea had an important influence upon later generations of thinkers. Twentieth-century French philosopher [[Michel Foucault]] argued that the Panopticon was paradigmatic of a whole raft of nineteenth-century 'disciplinary' institutions. | + | In the society that Orwell describes, everyone is under complete [[surveillance]] by the authorities, mainly by [[telescreen]]s. The people are constantly reminded of this by the phrase "Big Brother is watching you", which is the core "truth" of the [[propaganda]] system in this state. The physical description of Big Brother is reminiscent of [[Joseph Stalin]] or [[Horatio Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener|Lord Kitchener]]. His moustache is also similar to that of [[Adolf Hitler]]. |
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- Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)
Big Brother is a fictional character in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the enigmatic dictator of Oceania, a totalitarian state taken to its utmost logical consequence - where the ruling elite ('the Party') wield total power for its own sake over the inhabitants.
In the society that Orwell describes, everyone is under complete surveillance by the authorities, mainly by telescreens. The people are constantly reminded of this by the phrase "Big Brother is watching you", which is the core "truth" of the propaganda system in this state. The physical description of Big Brother is reminiscent of Joseph Stalin or Lord Kitchener. His moustache is also similar to that of Adolf Hitler.
Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Big Brother (Nineteen Eighty-Four)" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.
