Transcript No Slide Title

The
Culturally
Constructed
Body
Prof. Juliet Davis
Dept. of Communication
The University of Tampa

On one hand, the body is a biological entity.

But everything we believe we “know” about
the body is perceived through culture—
therefore, the body is culturally constructed.

Emily Martin
”Medical Metaphors
of Women’s Bodies:
Menstruation and
Menopause”
from The Woman in the Body, 1987.
Ancient Greece to 17th Century Britain
(p. 15-16):

Human bodies possess more “heat” than animals
and are therefore more perfect; male bodies
possess more “heat” than female bodies, and are
therefore more perfect.

Men’s and women’s bodies are similar—but
because women’s bodies are relatively cooler and
less perfect, they are incapable of developing
organs outside of the body.

This was a “biological fact” for hundreds of years.
19th Century: More “Biological Facts”
(p. 16-17)

Edward Tilt:
blood turns to fat after
menopause

Havelock Ellis:
Menstruation is pathological.
Women are “periodically
wounded” in their “most
sensitive spot” and “even in
the healthiest woman, a
worm however harmless and
unperceived, gnaws
periodically at the roots of
life.”
Patrick Geddes,
19th Century Biologist:
”It is generally true that the males
are more active, energetic, eager,
passionate, and variable; the
females more passive,
conservative, sluggish, and stable.
. . . The more active males, with a
consequently wider range of
experience, may have bigger
brains and more intelligence; but
the females, especially as
mothers, have indubitably a larger
and more habitual share of
altruistic emotions. The males
being usually stronger, have
greater independence and
courage; the females excel in
constancy of affection and in
sympathy” (p. 19)
For Men:
“Losing too much sperm meant
losing that which sperm was
believed to manufacture: a man’s
lifeblood” (p. 20)
Women (and their sexuality) were
a cause of death.
-Women’s races longer than 200m were
banned until 1960 when the 800m was
reintroduced.
-The women’s marathon was not added
until 1984.

20th Century

Belief that engaging
in sports would harm
women’s
reproductive organs.

“Biological Fact” for
males: As recently as
the 1950’s the
majority of Harvard
medical students
responded that they
believed
masturbation caused
blindness and
insanity in males.

20th and 21st Century

Lack of research on female biology leads to
widespread and dangerous misconceptions about
medical treatments for women (heart attack,
menopause, etc.)
Belief until the 1990’s that males were the suitable
subjects of research and that female biology should
either follow male biology or was too problematic to
study.
Common belief until end of 20th Century that heart
attack was a male medical issue.
NIH initiative in 1996 funded research for women.
The first significant studies of menopause were
funded.
Until 2002, doctors believed that estrogen prevented
heart attack in women. Studies undertaken to prove
this actually proved that it caused heart attack, stroke,
and breast cancer.
Until the 90’s, women’s hormones were not studied
because it was believed that they “fluctuated too
much.”
Studies on obesity were only conducted in men, even
though it affects primarily women.
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21st Century
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Belief that women are
biologically:
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not well suited for upper
management of
corporations
(only 6% of upper
management are women).

better “nurturers” than
men

better suited for
housekeeping than men

Emily Martin
”The Egg and the
Sperm: How Science
Has Constructed a
Romance Based on
Stereotypical MaleFemale Roles” from
Signs: Journal of
Women in Culture and
Society 16 (31), 1991.
Cultural mythologies about women not
being as worthy as men are supported in
medical texts, historically.

Menstruation is described
as the failure of the egg
to fertilize.
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It is about the egg dying.
At best, it is a sloughingoff.
(Read pg. 27)
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Also the connotation of
being useless, not
productive, wasteful, not
fulfilling desired role and
therefore out of control
(p. 29-30)
Sperm production and performance, on the
other hand, is “remarkable” and “amazing.”
(read p. 31)

Medical Physiology edited by
Vernon Mountcastle (1980):
”Whereas the female sheds only a
single gamete each month, the
somniferous tubules produce
hundreds of millions of sperm
each day.”
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Nothing about all those nasty
little deaths.
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No sloughing here—even though
semen consists of soughed matter
as well.
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Sperm depicted as powerful—
even though recent studies have
found that they have weak
forward force and that many
sperm are not ideally formed and
are unable to penetrate the egg
(this is normal).
Image by Lennart Nilsson
What would the Pope think?
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Religious Logic to Ponder:
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If masturbation is wrong
because it spills the seed (kills
sperm) that could fertilize an
egg, then how do women fit
into this logic?
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Is masturbation O.K. for
women, then, because it
doesn’t kill anything?

Is menstruation murder?
Representing Women
Tradition of the Nude
Ways of Seeing
by John Berger, 1972
Chapter 1
- Relationship between words and pictures
- How do what we know and what we believe affect the way we see art?
- How do our assumptions about art affect the way we see it?
- How does art become “mystified”?
- Who are the legitimate purveyors of the meaning of art?
- How is the value of art determined?
- How has reproduction affected the value of art?
Chapters 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
Look at what we consider to be “great works of art”
(specifically Renaissance paintings)
Ways of Seeing
Chapter 3 The Naked and The Nude
Based on The Nude by Kenneth Clark

Berger points out
that our western
traditions of
representing the
female body
unclothed actually
comes from the
Genesis tradition.
Genesis 3:16

And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that
it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to
make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof and did eat; and she
gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat.
And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they
were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made
themselves aprons. . . . And the Lord God called unto the man and
said unto him, “Where are thou?” and he said, “I heard they voice in
the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid
myself. . . .
Unto the woman God said, “I will greatly multiply thy pain and thy
conception. In pain thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire
shall be to thy husband and he shall rule over thee.”
The Unclothed Body
Nude
• Nakedness
objectified in
representation.
Naked
• Natural state + God’s Eyes
(culturally constructed
through concept of
shame/sin)
Natural
• We’re born in a natural
sate, not naked or nude.
• Nakedness can only be
named in comparison to a
clothed state.
The first European nude
paintings were of
Adam and Eve (p. 48-49),
usually in story form.
Left: Fall and Expulsion from
Paradise by Paul de Limbourg,
Early 15th Century
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Then, just the moment of
shame is shown in relationship
to the spectator.
The spectator becomes godlike, looking at the pair in
judgment.

It is the god-like spectator that
causes shame in the western
tradition of looking.
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Nakedness objectified in
representation = nude
Adam and Eve by Mabuse, Early 16th Century (Flemish)
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In the western tradition of
shamefulness and sin,
the nude woman is associated
with sexual promiscuity
and is an object to be
controlled/judged by the godlike spectator
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Also, through religious culture,
the unclothed state becomes
tantalizing, automatically
sexualized.
Memling
Vanity by
Memling 1435-1494
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Painters begin to depict
women alone on display,
subservient to the viewer
(who is male) as Adam
and Eve were subservient
to God.
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Tradition of mirrors also
used to show vanity.
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Hypocritical because the
woman has been created
for the male spectator’s
pleasure.
Vanity
Not all cultures see the body as
shameful.
Muwaji and daughter Iganani, of
the Amazon Suruwaha tribe
Suruwaha tribe
Nudists: Vacation Photos
Body Coverings in societies with
belief in body shame.
Other societies have traditions of shame and
modesty in relationship to the body as well,
and practice clothing/veiling
Soon shame becomes a kind of display, and women are depicted looking at viewer,
awareRubens
that they are being seen. This acknowledgment of shame to the viewer
Is as a sign of submission. Above: Nell Gwynne, Mistress of Charles II (1618-1680)
Ingres 1780-1867
La Grande Odalisque
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Bathsheba
Taking a Bath
Another
subservient
woman
He shows her
in a critical moment
Rembrandt 1654
Such displays are distinctly western Christian traditions.
Other Cultures Have Shown Sex Act Between People
Rather Than Putting Women on Display
Erotic Sculptures of Nad-Kalse (16th Century Rural India)
Kama Sutra - Hindu
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A culture of categorization
Japanese erotic art from the Edo
period (1603–1867)
Europe: 17th & 18th Centuries
The Original Age of Materialism?
Panini 1764
Picture Gallery of Cardinal Valenti Gonzaga
Gainsborough
Mr. And Mrs. Andrews
approx.1750
Stubbs
Lincolnshire Ox 1790
Heem
Dessert 1640
Jan Davidsz de Heem
Still Life with Oysters and a Peeled Lemon late 1660s or early 1670’s
Holbein
The Ambassadors (1533)
The tradition of female shame and submission extending from Genesis
merges
with the tradition of representing ownership in an age of materialism.
Rubens
Above: Nell Gwynne, Mistress of Charles II (1618-1680)
Rubens
Tintoretto 1518-1594
Susannah and the Elders
Titian
Venus with Mirror 1555
Rubens
Angelica and the Hermit 1630
Rembrant 1606-1669
Danae
Titian
Venus of Urbino 1538
Manet
Olympia 1863
Naked vs. Nude
Olympia's Boyz, 2001, digital C print, 134 x 168 inches, © Renée Cox,
Courtesy of Robert Miller Gallery, New York
Guerrilla Girls
Brainstorm:
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Nude
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Naked
Naked vs. Nude
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Nude
On display
Awareness of being
viewed as an act of
subservience in the
Christian tradition
To not be seen as one’s
self but as an object
Hundreds of thousands
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Naked
To be one’s self
To be in a process of
becoming
Perhaps only 100
Rubens
Helene of Fourment
“Men look at women. Women watch
themselves being looked at.”

Read page 46:

“A woman must constantly watch herself. She is
She is almost continually accompanied by her
own image of herself. Whilst she is walking
across a room or whilst she is weeping at the
death of her father, she can scarcely avoid
envisaging herself walking or weeping. From
earliest childhood she has been taught and
persuaded to survey herself continually.
And so she comes to consider the surveyor and
the surveyed within her as the two constituent
yet always distinct elements of her identity as a
woman. She has to survey everything she is and
everything she does because how she appears
to men, is of crucial importance for what is
normally thought of as the success of her life.
Berger’s Conclusions

What we see and how we see depend on our socialization.
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What we are socialized to see depends on who is in power.
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Berger’s Conclusion in Chapter 3 about “The Male Gaze”:
“But the essential way of seeing women, the essential use to which
their images are put, has not changed. Women are depicted in a
quite different way from men—not because the feminine is different
from the masculine--because the idea spectator is always assumed
to be male. . . .” (actually, the specatator is assumed to be white
heterosexual male in traditional images of women)

But now there are not only theories about this male gaze, but also a
female gaze, lesbian gaze, homosexual male gaze, etc., within
specific subcultures.
Review
Ways of Seeing
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Is the body biologically constructed or culturally constructed or
both? Explain.
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How is “nakedness” culturally constructed?
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What is a “nude?” What are the criteria for the nude?
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How does the tradition of the “nude” as an art form relate to
this cultural construction of “nakedness?”
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What does Berger believe is the significance of the Genesis
story to the western traditions of representing women? (Recall
the progression of his argument.)
What does Berger mean
by this passage referring to women?

(Page 46)
And so she comes to consider the surveyor and
the surveyed within her as the two constituent
yet always distinct elements of her identity as a
woman.

How do Muslims attempt to solve this problem?
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How do the Amish attempt to solve this
problem?
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How do nudists attempt to solve this problem?
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Do you think any of them are successful? How
do you think our culture could attempt to solve
this problem?
What is the
attitude this
model is
projecting?
What is she
communicating
To the viewer?
Does this Playboy image
remind you of any of the
Renaissance nudes?
Ingres
La Grande Odalisque
Who is the intended audience here?
Questions to Ponder:

If we are only permitted to see perfect nude bodies—
and the rest are covered up--what message does that
send us?

If we are only permitted to see sexualized nudity, what
message does that send us?
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If we only see nudity in pornography and advertising,
what message does that send us?
A Different Kind of Cover Girl?
We’re Used to Seeing This
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Naked or Nude?
Aware of being seen, but by an
equally unclothed audience.
In a family album aesthetic,
in action, rather than
as sex object.
Men are also featured naked
in these magazines,
in various travel activities
(hiking, etc.)
Nudist Philosphies
The body without clothes is normal and
not necessarily a sexual object.
 Equality – taking clothes off shows that
we’re all vulnerable and equal; nobody’s
perfect.
 People have to be respected for their
personhood and not merely what’s “on the
outside” (material coverings)

FIELD TRIP
Nudist Resorts
Lake Como
naturist, family resort, non-profit member-owned
- for-profit (seeking to sensationalize)
-family-friendly membership revoked
- special events to attract public
- reality TV show scheduled for Fall
Media Coverage of Public Presentation
Public Presentation
Cameras on Students
Students Viewing Nudists
Nudists

Time to review images
you brought to class.