Each body has certain cultural values attached to it regarding the way in which it should perform in public. The body is marked by dichotomous thinking (masculine/feminine, healthy/sick, sacred/degraded, artistic/pornographic, etc.) that dictates its presentation in visual culture. In Volatile Bodies: Toward a Corporeal Feminism, Elizabeth Grosz states the importance of non-dichotomous thinking for feminist and gender studies scholars and gives guidelines to deconstruct these hegemonic dualities. The purpose of this thesis is to show how the eroticization of the body of Other, in accordance with Groszs guidelines, can be useful in upsetting taken-for-granted social roles thus leading to non-dichotomous thinking of the body. The non-ideal but erotic/eroticized body cannot faithfully or consistently adhere to either the positive or negative side of the dichotomy since the two sides are both explicitly presented and contested concurrently. A (strategic) sexualization of the body of Other troubles both cultural and natural notions of what the body should be. The body of Other refers to any body that transgresses the contemporary views of a positive body image (healthy, whole, beautiful, youthful, etc.); and the sexualized Other refers to that transgressive body that takes on a contemporary meaning of what is thought to be erotic or sexual.
This thesis explores 6 photographs from contemporary Argentine photographers, Gabriela Liffschitz and María Zorzon and attempts to reveal conflicts about the dominant class thinking of the body and the injurious consequences of its implementation into popular visual culture. In this case the sexualized Others are simultaneously sacred and degraded (for various social reasons): the mothers body, the tattooed body, and the sick body. These bodies in some way all exhibit the qualities that Grosz enumerates and effectively defeat notions of nature/culture, active/passive, etc. to create distinct sexual bodies that do not depend on the pre-established norms of order and purity to be considered legitimate.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LSU/oai:etd.lsu.edu:etd-08252011-120930 |
| Date | 25 August 2011 |
| Creators | Hubbard, Kristen Michelle |
| Contributors | Martins, Laura, Morris, Andrea, Heneghan, Dorota |
| Publisher | LSU |
| Source Sets | Louisiana State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lsu.edu/docs/available/etd-08252011-120930/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached herein a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to LSU or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below and in appropriate University policies, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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