On viewing

The politics of looking at the corpse

Bibliographic Data

ID13006331
AuthorsJ Auchter (0000-0002-2686-5948, University of Tennessee at Knoxville, corresponding author)
Year2017
Volume7
Issue2
Pages223-238
Publication date2017-04-27
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueGlobal Discourse (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2043-7897 • E-ISSN: 2326-9995
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/23269995.2017.1314908
OpenAlexW2607722366
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited22

This paper assesses the politics of images of the dead body. Western cultural norms often dictate that dead bodies should not be viewable outside of the funerary industry, especially when they are graphic by virtue of a bloody and violent death. These cultural taboos tell us that dead bodies do not belong in the public sphere, and something extraordinary must be the case for them to be on display and rendered visible. However, rather than focus on the taboo itself that structures these regimes of visuality, this paper focuses on the political work these taboos do to enact particular performances of rehumanization and dehumanization of the dead. It traces the paradox of the ambivalent effects of dead bodies when they are rendered visible in global politics in two main ways: one, humanizing, to advocate for attention to a particular crisis-of-humanity, and two, to dehumanize particular dead bodies in the service of a narrative that depicts enemy bodies as killable

Aesthetics · Ambivalence · Art · Dehumanization · Humanity · Literature · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Taboo · Anthropology · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Global Security and Public Health · Law · Memory, Trauma, and Commemoration · Psychology