School, Orkut, and youth-connected: speaking, showing, spying, and disciplining

This article analyzes the youth subjectivities demanded for the discourse of some Orkut communities related to school. It brings an analysis of Cultural Studies concepts, such as youth culture, and concepts from Michel Foucault's studies, such as disciplinary power, subjectivation, pos-panopticon and sinoptism. The participation in Orkut communities here is understood as a strategy that leads youngsters to write about themselves. For one hand, the Orkut machinery works as a sort of panoptical device, through the activation of youth visualization and disciplinary techniques. On the other hand, Orkut uses the post-panoptical power relationships in the process of subjectivity production. The developed argument is that the communities' discourses are heterogeneous and the power relationships established take certain subjectivities and produce some truth effects that end up legitimizing education as related to the guarantee of successful future life.

youth; school; Orkut; subjectivation; discipline