The Lived Body: Sociological Themes, Embodied Issues

The Lived Body critically examines the notion of human enbodiment in both classical and contemporary thought. The ideas of a range key of thinkers from Marx to Feud, Foucault to Giddens, Deleuze and Guattari to Irigary and Grosz are assessed in terms of the bodily themes and issues they address. By using the notion of embodiment to transcend the dualist legacies of the past this book argues that the body is not simply a ‘textual effect’ or ‘discursive construct’. Rather, embodiment is the active basis of being in the world and the foundation of self, meaning, culture and society. It is not therefore a question of choosing between the experimental and representational aspects of the human body, but of exploring their dialectical relationship to one another. These issues are illustrated through a variety of themes, including the ‘fate’ of embodiment in late modernity, sex, gender and the ‘medicalization’ of the bosy, the sociology of emotions, pain, sleep and artistic images and representations of the body. An ‘embodied’ sociology is proposed, one which makes embodiment central rather than peripheral, and puts minds back into bodies, bodies back into society, and society back into the body. The Lived Body will provide students and researchers in medical sociology, health science, cultural studies and philosophy with clear, accessible coverage of the major theories and debates in body and social theory from basic issues to complex ideas and a challenging new way of thinking.