Incoded Counter-Conduct: What the Incarcerated Can Teach Us About Resisting Mass Surveillance

33 Pages Posted: 24 Oct 2014 Last revised: 17 Oct 2022

See all articles by Jessa Lingel

Jessa Lingel

Microsoft Corporation - Microsoft Research New England

Aram Sinnreich

American University School of Communication

Date Written: March 17, 2015

Abstract

This paper reviews penal history in order to consider forms of resistance to mass surveillance. Because experiences of surveillance are endemic to incarcerated life, identifying tactics of resistance among these populations provides valuable insights for potential forms of counter-conduct in other circumstances of ubiquitous monitoring. We introduce the term incodification as a means of describing conditions of continuous surveillance ingrained into infrastructures of everyday life, even as these conditions give rise to tactics of resistance. We focus on three forms of protest: hunger strikes, alternate communication networks and viral dance videos, drawing on Foucault’s theory of askesis in order to develop our understanding of incodification. Our objective in introducing this term, and with our analysis as a whole, is to provoke and promote theoretical and activist projects that both address and subvert infrastructures of incodification.

Keywords: surveillance, incarceration, counter-conduct, digital communications, resistance, activism, civil liberties, free speech, privacy, prison

Suggested Citation

Lingel, Jessa and Sinnreich, Aram, Incoded Counter-Conduct: What the Incarcerated Can Teach Us About Resisting Mass Surveillance (March 17, 2015). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2513585 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2513585

Jessa Lingel

Microsoft Corporation - Microsoft Research New England ( email )

One Memorial Drive, 14th Floor
Cambridge, MA 02142
United States

Aram Sinnreich (Contact Author)

American University School of Communication ( email )

Mary Graydon Center
4400 Massachusetts Av. NW
Washington, DC 20016
United States

HOME PAGE: http://www.american.edu/soc/

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