Body as Space 1

Reading Valentine Ch 2 especially pp Office Hours: –Mon 2:30-3:30 p.m. N412 Ross

Assignment #1 Directed essay (choice) Due Oct 21 circa 8 pages, word processed, double- spaced Use text but go beyond it –other texts in social geography, sociology, geography

Essay A How fundamental is the body to the field of social geography?

Essay B What is the importance of scale in the discussion of the social relations of place?

Body boundary between Self and Other

Michel Foucault Power and space intertwines Can explore power by looking into the places which it creates Power is a way of looking at things

Michel Foucault The Gaze: –a culturally-learned way of looking Self: the observer Other: what is observed Difference: –the Otherness of the Other

Body as personal space Cultural/spatial differences in personal space link 1 link 2

Body as location for identity, Difference for social relations site of social struggles, disputes

Disputed bodies social access to the body personal movement, conduct

Disputed bodies where should a body be?

What is a body? a temple? a machine? a prison? sacred/secular? private/public? natural/social?

Cartesian Dualism “I think therefore I am” (Rene Descartes) –Body and mind are separate body takes up space mind occupies no space –Justifies other dualisms: People vs Nature Culture vs Nature Mind vs Body –Plain wrong

Descartes Venerates the rational mind –vs bodily urges Body and universe –become a machine –something to be mapped, explored, dissected by rational science

Age of Reason Growth of rational science Culture venerates rationality, consciousness Represents educated (white, male) mind as –rational, scientific, critical, objective Others (women, non-white) represented as –irrational, emotional, superstitious, corporeal Dualism a basis of much Western thought

Spinoza C17th Dutch Jew Objected to Cartesian Dualism Proposed double-aspect theory: –Mental & physical different aspects of the same substance

C19th/C20th Changes Biology –Universe is not just a machine –Reveals the animal inside the human Analytical Psychiatry –Showed that the mind is both rational and irrational

Feminist contribution The body as an important “site” in social relations Connection between bodies and society Critique of dualism: –men/mind/culture vs women/bodies/nature –bodies, minds, society, the universe are all integrated

"They say television is making people dumber. What do they mean by that?" - Scott E. Roeben

Neil Postman Present-day media and culture critic TV and electronic media destroy intellectual culture we are –amusing ourselves to death (1986) –informing ourselves to death (1990s)

“We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.” — Robert Wilensky.

Dualisms Rene Descartes: bodiless heads Neil Postman: headless bodies

Critique of Postman Assumes technology shapes culture –culture shapes technology too Assumes people are passive consumers of media-generated images –They have a consciousness too –They create images and counter- images

Dualisms in Geography Enduring effect of Cartesian Dualism Rationality still venerated –Decision-makers supposed to be “rational” in economic geography Universal human subject –often white, heterosexual