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Introduction
Bryan S Turner
Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, Singapore
Elizabeth Eckermann
Arts Faculty, Deakin University, VIC
Derek Colquhoun
Centre for the Body and Society Faculty of Arts, Deakin University, VIC
Pat Crotty
Centre for the Body and Society Faculty of Arts, Deakin University, VIC
Article Text
To have embodiment as the theme of this volume of the Annual Review of Health Social Sciences is significant in that it represents the coming of age of the study of the body as a health social science research enterprise. This volume of the Annual Review has been edited and produced by the Centre for the Body and Society, Deakin University, which is a transdisciplinary Centre with its focus firmly on the body. Members of the Centre are drawn from education, social sciences and health and behavioural sciences. The transdisciplinary nature of the Centre is mirrored in the contributions to the Annual Review.
The contributors echo concerns with traditional approaches to the study of the body. A dominant theme throughout the volume is a recurring critique of medical definitions of the body and how these definitions have limited health social science research on the body. Many of the contributions identify the restrictive nature of these medical definitions yet optimistically offer suggestions for future research and directions for study. A particular strength of the volume is that the contributions form an eclectic collection illustrating the importance of the body to many areas such as disability, transsexualism, feminist research, ageing, occupational health and the introjection of cultural values into medical practice and policy in relation to diseases of civilisation. For ease of presentation the contributions have been categorised into empirical and theoretical studies.
Lewins begins the group of empirical studies by addressing a social science approach to transsexualism. He is strident in his critique of conventional medical assumptions which tend to confine individuals within a limiting and restrictive discourse on the manwoman dichotomy. Easthope focuses on the social construction of the disabled body and the role of prostheses in that construction. Using data from both the USA and Australia, Easthope adds to the discussion on the body which he contends has largely ignored the area of disability.
Turner and Riggs are concerned with personal identity, how it is sustained by social networks and how sickness affects intimacy and social relationships. Against a background critique of Giddens' ideas on intimacy and selfhood, Turner and Riggs clearly demonstrate the problems of developing a theory of the self without an adequate theory of the body. The importance of embodiment as a component of ageing and its relationship with intimacy are poignantly illustrated through the words of ageing persons.
The group of theoretical papers is headed by Hughes who looks at the social construction of risk around the so-called `diseases of civilisation'. Her critique of the rise of the risk factor approach produces the interesting concept of `virtual health and disease' and she demonstrates the tensions produced by the cultural underpinnings of much medical discourse related to risk factor control in disease prevention. The public policy implications of this are all the more important because of the central position accorded coronary heart disease in the health politics of affluent countries.
Peterson examines weaknesses in early biophysiological and psychophysiological approaches to stress. He argues that researchers in occupational stress would benefit from socio-cultural approaches which account for environmental and political processes. Liz Eckermann is critical of what she calls `malestream sociological traditions' for not addressing attempts at understanding gendered experiences of health and illness. She suggests that phenomenology, post-structuralism and postmodernism offer valuable theoretical frameworks for an analysis of sexually specific corporeality. Holmes presents a historical review of the body in nursing and suggests that nursing theory is generally void of any reasonable and useful explications of the body. However, Holmes concludes optimistically by providing examples of recent scholarship in nursing which attempt to address the sanitisation of the body from nursing theory.
Finally. Wenzel's patchwork of thoughts into the body reflects the ruminations which many of us share but have not had the opportunity to document. He contemplates the relationship between the body and time and he offers a cultural account of his experiences and thoughts.
Together this collection identifies several issues including the negotiation of identity, the recognition of social context and the importance of social networks, contradictory and contesting perceptions of the body and the importance of recognising the experiential aspects of embodiment. Moreover rather than discount the dominant medical discourse we take the stance that the study of the sociology of medicine is, in fact, the study of health phenomena but in a social setting or context. We regard the body in its different contexts as a major focus for future health social science research on the body. This volume has been a contribution to this discussion.
This year, instead of publishing the Directory of Health Social Scientists at the end of the Annual Review of Health Social Scientists, we will produce a separate booklet of all members. If you would like to be included in this listing, please complete the form at the end of this volume. A membership form for the Centre for the Body and Society is also included.
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