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‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping
In her lead article in this special issue, Monica Greco (2018) offers the concept of participating bodies as a ’possibility of conceiving bodies themselves—and bodily events such as disease/illness—as expressing values and perhaps even socially meaningful "preferences"’. Such a position se...
Autores principales: | , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BMJ Publishing Group
2019
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6699602/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31289218 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2018-011581 |
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author | Duschinsky, Robbie Reisz, Samantha Messina, Serena |
author_facet | Duschinsky, Robbie Reisz, Samantha Messina, Serena |
author_sort | Duschinsky, Robbie |
collection | PubMed |
description | In her lead article in this special issue, Monica Greco (2018) offers the concept of participating bodies as a ’possibility of conceiving bodies themselves—and bodily events such as disease/illness—as expressing values and perhaps even socially meaningful "preferences"’. Such a position seeks to avoid capitulation to a) an image of bodily processes as without values or responsiveness, object rather than participant; b) an image of human agents as unitary, self-knowing, sovereign choosers—unless ill. This article will explore this perspective as applied to the idea of coping. The article will explore strategies of everyday living, through particular consideration of Lauren Berlant’s reading of Two Girls, Fat and Thin by Mary Gaitskill. In her interpretation of the novel, Berlant assesses the kinds of problems for subjects and bodies that may be solved or managed through participation in or refraining from participation in thinking, food or sex. The account of coping and embodiment in Berlant’s reflections will then be placed in dialogue with findings by Alexandra Michel, who watched the process of physical burnout in investment banking associates during a 13-year cultural ethnography, observing as the bankers heeded or ignored the cues their bodies gave about the limits of feasible demands. The article as a whole offers an illustration of the value of Greco’s reflections for offering a fresh and valuable perspective on the concept of coping. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6699602 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | BMJ Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-66996022019-08-20 ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping Duschinsky, Robbie Reisz, Samantha Messina, Serena Med Humanit Original Research In her lead article in this special issue, Monica Greco (2018) offers the concept of participating bodies as a ’possibility of conceiving bodies themselves—and bodily events such as disease/illness—as expressing values and perhaps even socially meaningful "preferences"’. Such a position seeks to avoid capitulation to a) an image of bodily processes as without values or responsiveness, object rather than participant; b) an image of human agents as unitary, self-knowing, sovereign choosers—unless ill. This article will explore this perspective as applied to the idea of coping. The article will explore strategies of everyday living, through particular consideration of Lauren Berlant’s reading of Two Girls, Fat and Thin by Mary Gaitskill. In her interpretation of the novel, Berlant assesses the kinds of problems for subjects and bodies that may be solved or managed through participation in or refraining from participation in thinking, food or sex. The account of coping and embodiment in Berlant’s reflections will then be placed in dialogue with findings by Alexandra Michel, who watched the process of physical burnout in investment banking associates during a 13-year cultural ethnography, observing as the bankers heeded or ignored the cues their bodies gave about the limits of feasible demands. The article as a whole offers an illustration of the value of Greco’s reflections for offering a fresh and valuable perspective on the concept of coping. BMJ Publishing Group 2019-06 2019-07-09 /pmc/articles/PMC6699602/ /pubmed/31289218 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2018-011581 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
spellingShingle | Original Research Duschinsky, Robbie Reisz, Samantha Messina, Serena ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title | ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title_full | ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title_fullStr | ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title_full_unstemmed | ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title_short | ‘Pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
title_sort | ‘pulling the world in and pushing it away’: participating bodies and the concept of coping |
topic | Original Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6699602/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31289218 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2018-011581 |
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