Gender, Sexuality & the Body

  Disciplining Athletic Bodies (3/2) Foucault claimed that society and culture "discipline" bodies; forcing them to conform to its norms. Athletic bodies are symbolic representations of culture and their performance is a source of cultural pride, making them particularly open to scrutiny. Using the articles in the section on "athletic bodies" discuss how definitions of gender lead to the unequal disciplining of male and female bodies.  What are the expectations for men's and women's athletic bodies and how does  sexuality  and  sexual preference  affect these expectations? Discuss the various ways sex has been defined for the purpose of this discipline Make sure that you support your discussion with examples from your readings How are  racialized  bodies disciplined, and how does this discipline reflect cultural beliefs? Make sure that you support your discussion with examples from your readings Minimum 5 paragraphs

  A Taxonomy of Gay Men :  Gay Body Types Type Build Hair Age Example Celebrity Notes Otter Thin or athletic Lots Any age Scott Caan Part of the extended bear community Wolf Lean, muscular Semi-Hairy Any age Joe Manganiello Sexually aggressive; Silver or grey wolf is an older wolf Bear Big, often with a belly Lots Any John Travolta Very masculine Cub Husky Lots Young or younger-looking Jack Black Sugar cubs and muscle cubs are sub-types Chub Real big Maybe Any John Goodman Distinct from bears Pup Slender No Young Joe Jonas Energetic, cute, and naive Bull Super-built Maybe Any Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Twink Slender No Young Justin Beiber Self-centered, usually between 18 and the mid-20’s Twunk Muscular but slender No Young The muscular version of Beiber A more muscular Twink Gym Bunny Sculpted Maybe Under 50 Shemar Moore Fitness associated with gym, not sports Jock Muscular and athletic Maybe Any David Beckham Fitness is associated with sports Gym Rat Very lean and well-built...

in everyday life, our bodies are absent, not because we do not pay attention to what they experience, but precisely because we do experience them  as  absent: “experiences of bodily  absence ”  Health is the silent body, and illness is the body made apparent: The advent of AIDS […] has literally made the body of the gay male an object of massive public curiosity and relentless cultural inquiry. His body is now widely perceived as a site of mysterious and fatal infections—a perception that has prompted its radical (re)othering and (re)medicalizing. The body has emerged as a supertext, a territory over which a bewildering number of competing medical, political, and cultural fictions seek domination. (Nelson 2) THE GAY MALE CLONE:  strong link exists (pre-AIDS)between being gay and taking care of one's body: going to the gym is an integral part of the gay urban lifestyle; gyms are places that are as important to gay neighborhoods as bars, discos and bathhouses....

  FILM  Muscle Moll & Butch Ballplayer: Women's Bodies and Athletics (Cahn) Looking at the development of women's athletics from 1900-1960 (and beyond) one can see that women's participation is sports has always been fraught with questions about FEMININITY. Athletics were defined as a MALE enterprise:  competition, strength, aggression, physicality, athleticism  all had a MASCULINIZING affect.  men played games together in this all male domain, but also affirmed their manhood women who displayed these features risks some as of their womanhood/femininity. the fear of lesbians in sport is mirrored by the rise of relative homophobia in society (as is illustrated in the changing views through WWI and WWII). Figure of the mannish lesbian athlete during times of scrutiny is always countered in some way by the corrective image of the feminine, beauty queen CHRIS EVERETT vs MARTINA NAVRATALOVA (e.g.) some version of this since the 1900s had beauty pageants at women'...

ISSUES OF ABORTION CROSS CULTURALLY--Japan and Buddhism (1)  Japanese obstetricians do not practice aggressive prenatal screening; women are encouraged to accept the baby that is born, and fetal selection for birth abnormalities or sex is regarded as unethical.  (2) A fetus is humanized—so much so that obstetricians routinely hail their clients as “Mom,” even from the early stages of the pregnancy.  (3) At the same time, terminating a pregnancy is accepted as a morally sound means of preventing a situation in which a child would go uncared for. Small statues commemorating the unborn at Buddhist temples mark an institutionalized space in which women mourn their aborted fetuses. (4) The discourse of “choice” offers little space to recognize the conflicted feelings often associated with terminating a pregnancy on the part of women, abortion rights advocates, and even health care practitioners themselves.  (5) The fetus is humanized in many contexts, and yet abortion is ...