Document Detail


Modern medicine and the "uncertain body": from corporeality to hyperreality?
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  9257396     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
This paper (re)considers the role of medical technology at three interrelated levels: first, the extent to which medical technology renders our bodies increasingly "uncertain" at the turn of the century; second, the analytical purchase which the notion of the (medical) cyborg provides regarding contemporary forms of human embodiment; and finally, at a broader level, the issues this raises in relation to a (late) modernist or postmodernist reading of contemporary medical practice. Key themes here include the plastic body, the bionic body, communal/interchangeable bodies, (genetically) engineered/ chosen bodies, and virtual bodies. The paper concludes with a critical appraisal of these themes and issues, arguing for a late modernist position on medical technology as both a positive and negative rationalising force, and a "life political agenda" in which the "all-too-human" quality of human nature is seen as inviolable.
Authors:
S J Williams
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Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article    
Journal Detail:
Title:  Social science & medicine (1982)     Volume:  45     ISSN:  0277-9536     ISO Abbreviation:  Soc Sci Med     Publication Date:  1997 Oct 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  1997-09-17     Completed Date:  1997-09-17     Revised Date:  2004-11-17    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  8303205     Medline TA:  Soc Sci Med     Country:  ENGLAND    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  1041-9     Citation Subset:  IM    
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, University of Warwick, Coventry, England, U.K.
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MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Bionics
Ethics, Medical
Gene Therapy
Humans
Philosophy
Technology, Medical* / trends
Transplantation

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


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