From Body Politics to Body Shops: Power, Subjectivity, and the Body in an Era of Global Capitalism
Abstract
Examines how major social forces -- capital, technology, science, & markets -- "become embedded in the psychophysical nexus of individual human bodies so thoroughly that machinic performances become close to instinctual operations." A critical rereading is offered of machine technology in modern capitalist society to explore how the body, "as psyche & physique, mediates the machinic force of states (the body politic) & markets (the body shop)." As an exercise in "deep technology," the dynamics of bodies & bodybuilding are explored to reveal both corporal & ontological assumptions inherent in modern nation-states & markets. The creation of the "technified" body through the use of workout machines such as the Nordic Track/Nordic Flex is analyzed within the social, political, technical, & disciplinary machinations of the "global machine" of capitalism; relations of the individual body to the body shop & body politic are explored. The argument is framed with particular reference to the theories of Thomas Hobbes 1962), Adam Smith (1987), Donna Haraway (1991), Bruno Latour (1993), & William Greider (1996). 28 References. K. Hyatt Stewart
Themen
Capitalism, Human Body, Markets, Modernity, Power, State, Technology, Worker Machine Relationship
Sprachen
Englisch
Verlag
U Minnesota Press
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