Overview
- Realigns and brings together theoretical arguments from a variety of areas within sociology/social theory
- Offers an innovative synthesis of existing ideas about the influences of collective social life on the body
- Suggest useful ways to expand Bourdieu’s concept of habitus beyond social class
Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Relational Sociology (PSRS)
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About this book
This book presents a novel theoretical account of the claim that sexed and gendered bodies are socially constructed. In order to do so it critically reconstructs and combines existing theories of the embodiment of social identity (Bourdieu, Foucault, Butler) with the constructionist account of the Sociology of Knowledge (Strong Programme). This allows the author to develop a detailed conceptual apparatus which helps to analyse the nature of sexed and gendered bodies as social institutions. This book argues for a view of the body as an ‘artificial kind’ of entity which is the effect of contingent and localized practices and that incorporates both social and natural determinants. In doing so, the book reformulates key sociological dichotomies such as nature/society; structure/agency and domination/resistance, critically analysing different structuralist positions and advancing an ‘intrinsic’ structuralist model which foregrounds the importance of human relations in the constitution of social phenomena. This theoretical investigation has important methodological implications for empirical research into the formation of sex and gender identities and practices, enabling a more objective and naturalistic approach to empirical data concerning social phenomena.
Keywords
Table of contents (9 chapters)
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Front Matter
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General Overview: Introducing the Debate on Social Constructionism of the Body
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Front Matter
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Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice and the Performative Theory: A Critical Comparison
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Irene Rafanell is a lecturer at the University of the West of Scotland, UK where she teaches on gender theory, sociology of the body and social theory. Her work explores the connections between social theory, social constructionism, sociology of knowledge and the body. She has also published on the role of micro-affective dynamics on the constitution of social phenomena.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Making Bodies
Book Subtitle: Sexed and Gendered Bodies as Social Institutions
Authors: Irene Rafanell
Series Title: Palgrave Studies in Relational Sociology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-45477-6
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
eBook Packages: Social Sciences, Social Sciences (R0)
Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2023
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-031-45476-9Published: 10 February 2024
Softcover ISBN: 978-3-031-45479-0Due: 12 March 2024
eBook ISBN: 978-3-031-45477-6Published: 09 February 2024
Series ISSN: 2946-4110
Series E-ISSN: 2946-4129
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XVII, 385
Number of Illustrations: 15 b/w illustrations
Topics: Sociological Theory, Sociology of the Body, Gender and Sexuality, Social Theory, Feminism