Beginning with the uncanny case of phantom pain, as it is experienced, for example, by the amputee, and taking in consideration M. Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological descriptions and inputs on the subject, in this paper we aim to meditate on the nature and way of being of our complex corporality. Our perspective will be developed along the phenomenological analysis of the phantom limb experience, as it allows us to sketch a precise and detailed approach to the phantasmagorical way of being of the (...) body. (shrink)

In everyday life, we usually go by theone-body-one-person rule: one person has one body. This social belief builds on two assumptions: bodies are individual units and they are the same in different situations. This is also the conceptual resource for social theories that build on the notion of individuals. In this article, we turn it into a sociological topic. We develop a vocabulary for reconstructing bodily one-ness and bodily sameness as practically achieved social order, asbody boundary work: what belongs to (...) a body is a matter of local practices that define its situational contours, limits and margins. Practices of identification and personification draw on social memories and enact bodies as trans-situational entities. Persons and bodies, we argue, evolve in co-individuation. Personal corporality, then, can be conceptualized as abody of workthat encompasses these practical efforts of boundary-making. (shrink)

We draw on the concept of dignity to consider the ethics of the disposal of amputated limbs. The ethics of the management and disposal of human tissue has been subject to greater scrutiny and discussion in recent years, although the disposal of the limbs often remains absent from such discourses. In light of the recent UK controversy regarding failures in the medical waste disposal and the stockpiling of waste (including body parts), the appropriate handling of human tissue has been subject (...) to further scrutiny. Although this scandal has evoked concern regarding procurement and supply chain issues, as well as possible health and safety risks from such a ‘stockpile’, the dignity of those patients’ implicated in this controversy has been less widely discussed. Drawing at Foster’s (2014) work, we argue that a dignity framework provides a useful lens to frame consideration of the disposal of limbs after amputation. Such a framework may be difficult to reconcile with the logic of business and the ‘biovalue’ of the medical waste, but would we argue afford more patient-centred approaches towards disposal. It may also facilitate better practices to help mitigate future stockpiling incidences. (shrink)

By drawing on Jean-Luc Nancy’s philosophy of ontological relationality, this article explores what it means to be a ‘we’ in breast cancer. What are the characteristics—the extent and diversity—of couples’ relationally lived experiences of bodily changes in breast cancer? Through analyzing duo interviews with diagnosed women and their partners, four ways of sharing an embodied life are identified. (1) While ‘being different together’, partners have different, albeit connected kinds of experiences of breast cancer. (2) While ‘being there for you’, partners (...) take care of each other in mutually dependent ways. (3) While ‘being reconnected to you’, partners (re-)relate to each other through intimacy and sexuality. (4) While ‘being like you’, partners synchronize their embodied daily lives to one another, sometimes up to the point that the self cannot be distinguished from the other anymore. These ways reveal that being a ‘we’ involves complex affective, bodily encounters in which the many fault lines that both separate partners into individual selves and join them together as a unity are continuously reshaped and negotiated. Being a ‘we’ may be understood as something we have to do. Therefore, in being true to the legacy of Nancy, we argue at the end of this article for a sensible praxis of sharing a life and body, particularly in breast cancer. (shrink)

Phenomenology provides a method for disability theorists to describe embodied subjectivity lacking within the social model of disability. Within the literature on body integrity identity disorder (BIID), dominant narratives of disability are influential, individual bodies are considered in isolation, and experiences of disabled people are omitted. Research on BIID tends to incorporate an individualist ontology. In this article, I argue that Merleau-Ponty's conceptualization of “being in the world,” which recognizes subjectivity as embodied and intersubjective, provides a better starting point for (...) research describing the experiences of those with BIID and amputees. (shrink)

Cet article analyse les vécus quotidiens des personnes amputées des membres inférieurs avec leur prothèse, au cours des dix-huit premiers mois post-rééducation. L’étude se base sur une enquête ethnographique et longitudinale réalisée auprès de quatorze personnes nouvellement amputées d’un ou des deux membres inférieurs. Elle porte spécifiquement sur l’analyse croisée des discours et retours d’expérience des personnes amputées vis-à-vis de leur vécu quotidien et de leur accommodement avec la prothèse, recueillis lors d’entretiens semi-directifs menés un an et demi après la (...) fin de leur séjour de rééducation. Dans cet article, au prisme du handicap, le vécu quotidien avec la prothèse est analysé sous deux angles. Le premier se concentre sur les usages au quotidien de la prothèse et de ses retentissements sur les situations de handicap. Le second porte sur les diverses stratégies sociales mises en place par les personnes amputées lors des interactions sociales vis-à-vis de la visibilité et/ou invisibilité de la prothèse venant réinterroger les normes et les enjeux en lien avec le validisme. (shrink)

Current philosophical literature is saturated with the debate on biomedical enhancement, where bio-liberals and conservatives alike make compelling arguments for and against the enterprise. However, this literature is yet to consider the impact such enhancement would have on the individual’s actual lived experience. This article seeks to remedy that by situating the bioethics debate within the phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, specifically theorising how biomedical enhancement of the physical kind would impact Merleau-Ponty’s notion of the body-subject. The central issue arises when (...) the reciprocal relationship between the physical body and phenomenal world (termed “body/world dynamic”) is shown to be off-balance because of the rapid rate at which human beings continue to “enhance” their environment. In this, we see that the development of the world has outweighed that of the body to the extent that we, as body-subjects, have become maladapted to the place we call home. This article will suggest that we can attempt to resolve this by restoring the balance of the body/world dynamic with “restrictive” enhancement, thereby providing an ethical justification for the pursuit of the enterprise. (shrink)

Um aspeto fundamental do modo de ser da nossa corporeidade complexa, sugerido na primeira parte deste trabalho pelo alinhamento da experiência do amputado com a experiência do luto, permaneceu aí implícito e não enfrentado, sendo agora o momento de o retomar: trata-‑se de saber que papel desempenha o corpo na própria origem da relação intersubjetiva -‑ ou, se quisermos, como pode contribuir para resolver o “problema da existência de outras mentes”. Voltando ao horizonte do projeto fenomenológico merleau-‑pontyano, a nossa questão (...) de fundo será agora a de investigar em que medida é ainda através do modo de ser do corpo que a palavra “Eu” se pode “colocar no plural”. (shrink)