An Analysis Of Mamet’s Three Plays From The Perspective Of Foucault’s Power And Discourse Theories

As one of the leading contemporary playwrights in the United States, David Mamet endeavors to depict the human relationships in the modern American society. The relationships between Mamet’s characters are distorted in the struggle for power and dominance. Based on Michel Foucault’s theories and philosophical thoughts on power and discourse, this thesis reads closely Mamet’s three representative plays:American Buffalo, A Life in the Theatre and Oleanna, focusing on the analysis of power relations that permeate throughout them, as well as the functions of discourse in constructing and subverting the power relations.This thesis holds that first of all, the teacher-student paradigm serves as a manifestation of power relations:in Mamet’s three plays, the senior, experienced and knowledgeable characters automatically assume the role of teachers to dominate the students who are in an inferior position, so as to gain power and secure their privileges. Besides, power relations are also represented in the relationships between two genders:the struggles for power lead to the tensions and conflicts between men and women. Mamet’s male characters strive to dominate female ones by marginalizing them and depriving of their discourse to consolidate their masculine authority. Nonetheless, power is a fluid system, within which the oppressed and marginalized ones will inevitably resist and fight back, finally subverting the former power relations. Consequently, through the students’ vigorous counter-blows and the females’initiative attacks, Mamet’s three plays end with a subversion of both the original teacher-student paradigm and relationship between two genders. Last but not least, after an analysis of the relationships between discourse and power, this thesis comes to the conclusion that power can only exert its influence through the means of discourse:the teachers gain the dominance over the students by giving them lectures and instructions; yet when the students take control of the discourse in the end, they turn the tables. While male characters control females through absolute monopolization of discourse; however, the female ones are also on the rise. They rid themselves of the marginalized roles, take charge of the discourse and finally succeed in subverting the masculine authority, which demonstrates fully Foucault’s theories on power and discourse.