It so happened that this weekend when I was searching for some of my old Linguistics books, got hold of my bound course work on Semiotics and Philosophy of Language. Though I used to hate this paper in my MA days (but had no option as it was a compulsory paper), just surfed through it after a long time... felt nice... Derrida, Nietzsche, Foucault... their views on life & philosophy, never interested me. But now when I am reading them... seems making sense above everything else.
One such concept I read about is HEGEMONY... somewhat synonymous with Power, but in a different sense. Just quoting few lines: Power is the central fact of the history of human experience. Power constitutes the dominant moments of our relations in society and culture. Power is defined by Max Weber as the possibility of imposing one's will upon others behavor. It can be exercised in various ways: through coercion, with others willingly submitting to it out of fear, through bargain where submission is won through rewards or conditioned power where submission is a willing choice out of conviction.
The concept of hegemony is the acceptance of power through legitimisation, tinging it with principles, values or ideology. Let me give some examples: ideologically inspired by the causes, the LTTE terrorists are commanded by their leaders to the extent of human bombs, willingly laying their lives. Culturally conditioned, an Indian wife submits to her husband's domination. SO power is all cultural, ideological power, it is not an attribute that someone possesses more than others, but a network of relations between the dominated and the dominating. Dominant ideologies put forth by the cultural institutions like society, politics, religion, and most importantly, media. They create a compatible version of reality and are made to seem so natural as 'common sense', that we donot even question the assumptions made!!
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