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ANTHROPOLOGIES OF THE BODY. Scheper-Hughes & Lock – “the mindful body” Phenomenology & embodiment Bourdieu – Structure, habitus, practice. Scheper-Hughes & Lock: anthropology of the body.
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ANTHROPOLOGIES OF THE BODY • Scheper-Hughes & Lock – “the mindful body” • Phenomenology & embodiment • Bourdieu – Structure, habitus, practice
Scheper-Hughes & Lock: anthropology of the body • “The body as simultaneously a physical and symbolic artifact, naturally and culturally produced, anchored in a particular historical moment” • Four bodies – individual body, social body, and body politic, the mindful body • separate but overlapping units of analysis • different theoretical approaches • phenomenology, structuralism and symbolism, post-structuralism (practice theory – structure & agency)
The Individual Body • lived experience of the body-self, body, mind, matter, psyche, soul
The Social Body • representational uses of the body as a natural symbol with which to think about nature, society, culture
The Body Politic • regulation, surveillance, & control of bodies (individual & collective) in reproduction & sexuality, in work & leisure, in sickness & other forms of deviance
The Mindful Body • the most immediate, the proximate terrain where social truths and social contradictions are played out • a locus of personal and social resistance, creativity, and struggle • emotions form the mediatrix between the individual, social and political body, unified through the concept of the 'mindful body.'
PHENOMENOLOGY & EMBODIMENT • Body is not an object to be studied in relation to culture, but is to be considered as the SUBJECT of culture • body is a setting in relation to the world; consciousness is the body projecting itself into the world • Experience not a primordial existential given but a historically and culturally constitutes process predicated on certain ways of being in the world
STRUCTURE, HABITUS, PRACTICE (agency) • Structure – a particular class of conditions of existence produce habitus • Habitus – regulated and regular without being in any way the product of obedience to rules • habitus can be collectively orchestrated without being the product of the organizing action of a conductor • Social agents operate according to their "feel for the game" (the "feel" being, roughly, habitus, and the "game" being the structure).
STRUCTURE, HABITUS, PRACTICE (agency) • Practical sense (practice) -- proleptic adjustment (anticipatory) to demands of a field (structure) • encounter between habitus and a field which makes possible the near-perfect anticipation of the future inscribed in all the concrete configurations (structure) • the experience -- objective structures -- played out as the feel for direction, orientation, impending outcome
Gender: the individual body, the social body, the body politic, and habitus • Sex, sexuality, & gender • Not the same thing
Sex & the individual body • differences in biology • Is this a man or woman? • How do you know?
Sex & the Social Body • Tells us part of the story, but not all of the story
Gender • GENDER - the cultural construction of male & female characteristics • vs. the biological nature of men & women • SEX differences are biological - GENDER differences are cultural • behavioral & attitudinal differences from social & cultural rather than biological point of view • Gender refers to the ways members of the two sexes are perceived, evaluated and expected to behave
Gender Boundaries • since gender is culturally constructed the boundaries are conceptual rather than physical • Boundaries require markers to indicate gender • the boundaries are dynamic, eg. now it is acceptable for men to wear earrings
Boundary Markers • Voice • Physique • Dress • Behaviour • Hair style • Kinetics • Language use
Boundary Markers & Inter-personal Interaction • How do we react when someone seems to have traits of each category? • social intercourse requires that the interacting parties know to which gender category `the other' belongs Felicita Vestvali1824 - 1880 New York opera star who specialized in singing contralto "trouser roles."
Women cross dress all the time. The difference is perception. Acceptance or Rejection by society
Blurring the Boundaries • persistence of dualisms in ideologies of gender • other categories - every society including our own is at some time or other faced with people who do not fit into its sex & gender categories
“Third” Gender • a significant number of people are born with genitalia that is neither clearly male or female • Hermaphrodites • persons who change their biological sex • persons who exhibit behavior deemed appropriate for the opposite sex • persons who take on other gender roles other than those indicated by their genitals
“Third” Gender • multiple cultural & historical worlds in which people of divergent gender & sexual desire exist • margins or borders of society • may pass as normal to remain hidden in the official ideology & everyday commerce of social life • In some societies when discovered - iconic matter out of place - "monsters of the cultural imagination“ • third gender as sexual deviance a common theme in N. America
Sexuality & the body politic • all societies regulate sexuality • lots of variation cross-culturally • degree of restrictiveness not always consistent through life span • adolescence vs. adulthood • Varieties of “normative” sexual orientation • Heterosexual, homosexual, transexual • Sexuality in societies change over time
Sexuality as body politics • sex acts have varying social significance and subjective meanings in accordance with the cultural context in which they occur • as evidenced by cross-cultural variation in sex categories and labels • the underlying assumption -- sexuality is mediated by cultural and historical factors • distinctions to be made between sexual acts, sexual identities, and sexual communities.
GENDER & POWER • gender roles - tasks & activities that a culture assigns to sexes • gender stereotypes - oversimplified strongly held ideas about the characteristics of men & women & third sex-third gender • gender stratification - unequal distribution of rewards (socially valued resources, power, prestige, personal freedom) between men & women reflecting their position in the social hierarchy
Social Stratification & Gender • Gender is an important dimension of social inequality • Gender stratification frequently takes the form of patriarchy whereby men dominate women • Do women in our society have a second class status relative to men? If so How?
universals versus particulars • universal subordination of women is often cited as one of the true cross-cultural universals, a pan-cultural fact • Engels called it the “world historical defeat of women” • even so the particulars of women’s roles, statuses, power, and value differ tremendously by culture
The Poetics & Politics of Bodies • Body image as text/representation • The poetics of the text/representation • identify aesthetic elements, narrative structures, epistemology • The politics of text/representation • Behavior (structure) controls perception • the body image experienced in perception approximates that anticipated by the cognized & behaving self. • the use of the body-as-symbol and the distortion of the body image for communicative purposes • Images of our bodies is a basic component of our concept of our self and our personal identity.
Some Observations of Bodies in N. America • media's increasing use of slim female models and images of nearly unattainable body measurements • young women are subjected to images of the “perfect” female body and are subsequently distorting their own body images • Complaints about body fat have become normal discourse among females • “This pattern of body image distortion is considerably more pronounced and more common in women than in men, to the point that it is considered a characteristically female phenomenon (1999). • new field of social aesthetics
Western Male Bodies & Taiwanese Male Bodies • Body image disorders appear to be more prevalent in Western than non-Western men • Previous studies have shown that young Western men display unrealistic body ideals and that Western advertising seems to place an increasing value on the male body • Do Taiwanese men exhibit less dissatisfaction with their bodies than Western men? • Does Taiwanese advertising place less value on the male body than Western media? • Am J Psychiatry 162:263-269, February 2005
Men & Poetics/Politics of Male Bodies: advertising & self • Taiwanese men exhibited significantly less body dissatisfaction than their Western counterparts. • In the magazine study, American magazine advertisements portrayed undressed Western men frequently, but Taiwanese magazines portrayed undressed Asian men rarely
Conclusions • Taiwan appears less preoccupied with male body image than Western societies. • This difference may reflect • Western traditions emphasizing muscularity and fitness as a measure of masculinity • increasing exposure of Western men to muscular male bodies in media images • greater decline in traditional male roles in the West, leading to greater emphasis on the body as a measure of masculinity • These factors may explain why body dysmorphic disorder and anabolic steroid abuse are more serious problems in the West than in Taiwan.
Discourse, Subjectivity, Power • Discourses • a system of representation • Codes and conventions • rules and practices that produce meaningful statements and regulate discourse in different historical periods • "Discourse, Foucault argues, “constructs the topic. It defines and produces the objects of our knowledge. It governs the way that a topic can be meaningfully talked about and reasoned about.”
Concepts of the Individual, self, person in anthropology • Individual as member of humankinde (biologistic) • Self as locus of experience (psychologistic) • Person as agent-in-society (sociologistic)
Identity and Subjectivity • Social order -- arrays of identifications jockeying for position, gaining and losing strength, clashing with others, aligning with still others, and defining the texture of social action in their activity. • Subjectivity – complex negotiation of representation & experience • constructing the subject, constructing agency, constituting subjectivity
Discourse, Subjectivity, Power • Discourse -- the bearer of various subject positions • Subject positions -- specific positions of agency and identity in relation to particular forms of knowledge and practice • Subjectivity --produced within discourse, subjected to discourse. • subject position--[for us to become the subject of a particular discourse, and thus the bearers of its power/knowledge] we must locate ourselves in the position from which the discourse makes most sense, and thus become its 'subjects' by subjecting' ourselves to its meanings, power and regulation.
Discourse, Gender, Power • sexuality and the body -- sites of power and politics • socially imposed structures that objectified sexual identity and gender differences • socially imposed structures that shape gender relations and behavior