Sketch of Discourse and Power in Don DeLillo’s White Noise

Abstract

In White Noise (1985), Don DeLillo shows the web of systems predominating late twentieth century society. DeLillo illustrates the organizations of supermarket, media, and even drug as new discourses of power in postmodern condition in which, according to Michele Foucault, power is diffuse, and power conflicts can happen at many different sites and levels. This study is an exegesis of Foucault’s central concept for understanding representations, and the intersections of discourse, power, and the subject in Don DeLillo’s White Noise in which power disseminates through different social and cultural discourses.