Embodiment and Cultural Differences focuses on the body as the equilibrium limit between the memory of time already passed and the dynamic where of unexpected happenings. The body’s ecology is fulfilled in the surrounding environment within this variable limit. Each embodiment operation is, in fact, an experimental setting that consists of the unrepeatable executive instants through which, like a musical score, the body synchronises human consciousness with the context of action. What distinguishes the architecture of this book is that, collectively, it constitutes a challenge to the digital media paradigm, in which the body is treated simply as a two dimensional icon of space and time; a relatively “free form” with all kinds of narratives generated by the multimedia. The volume demonstrates how fundamentally different ways of experiencing time are also determined by the differing cultural use of bodily rhythms. Central to the understanding of this interdependence is the study of synchronisation – increasing knowledge through the investigation of how rhythm, music, chants, dance, prayer and other harmonising practices support social integration. The book also touches upon the anxieties, fears, and ambivalences affecting contemporary European societies, particularly those that have followed in the wake of terrorist attacks and the influx of refugee populations. The participating authors are all members of the International Sociological Association, and part of the Research Committee 54 “The Body in the Social Sciences”. This is, in short, a book that will attract wide interest, especially from social scientists, researchers and academics in the social sciences, sociology, and digital studies, in addition to further afield, for example, in health, philosophy, education, and anthropology.

American culture has literally become fixated on the body at the same time that the body has emerged as a key term within critical and cultural theory. Contributions thus address the body as a site of the cultural construction of various identities, which are themselves enacted, negotiated, or subverted through bodily practices. Contributions come from literary and cultural studies, film and media studies, history and sociology, and women studies, and are representative of many theoretical positions, hermeneutic, historical, structuralist, feminist, postmodernist. They deal with representations and discursifications of the body in a broad array of texts, in literature, the visual arts, theater, the performing arts, film and mass media, science and technology, as well as in various cultural practices.

He also addresses concerns about how dance performance is documented, including issues around spectatorship and the display of sexuality, the relationship of Ailey's dances to civil rights activism, and the establishment and maintenance of a successful, large-scale Black Arts institution."--Jacket.

This volume shows that the notions of embodied or situated cognition, which have transformed the scientific study of intelligence have the potential to reorient cultural studies as well. The essays adapt and amplify embodied cognition in such different fields as art history, literature, history of science, religious studies, philosophy, biology, and cognitive science. The topics include the biological genesis of teleology, the dependence of meaning in signs upon biological embodiment, the notion of image schema and the concept of force in cognitive semantics, pictorial self-portraiture as a means to study self-perception, the difference between reading aloud and silent reading as a way to make sense of literary texts, intermodal (kinesthetic) understanding of art, psychosomatic medicine, laughter as a medical and ethical phenomenon, the valuation of laughter and the body in religion, and how embodied cognition revives and extends earlier attempts to develop a philosophical anthropology. (Series A)

Perspectives on Embodiment offers multiple ways of conceptualizing human corporeality. These essays collectively defy arbitrary distinctions between nature and culture and reveal the complex ways in which nature and culture interact to produce embodied subjects. A central premise of this collection is that a variety of perspectives is needed to illuminate the fluid, ever-changing features of human corporeality. This book not only explores what it means to be an embodied subject, but also encourages speculation about our future bodily incarnations.

Journeys of Embodiment at the Intersection of Body and Culture: The Developmental Theory of Embodiment describes an innovative developmental and feminist theory—understanding embodiment—to provide a new perspective on the interactions between the social environment of girls and young women of different social locations and their embodied experience of engagement with the world around them. The book proposes that the multitude of social experiences described by girls and women shape their body experiences via three core pathways: experiences in the physical domain, experiences in the mental domain and experiences related directly to social power. The book is structured around each developmental stage in the body journey of girls and young women, as influenced by their experience of embodiment. The theory builds on the emergent constructs of 'embodiment' and 'body journey,' and the key social experiences which shape embodiment throughout development and adolescence—from agency, functionality and passion during early childhood to restriction, shame and varied expressions of self-harm during and following puberty. By addressing not only adverse experiences at the intersection of gender, social class, ethnocultural grouping, resilience and facilitative social factors, the theory outlines constructive pathways toward transformation. It contends that both protective and risk factors are organized along these three pathways, with the positive and negative aspects conceptualized as Physical Freedom (vs. Corseting), Mental Freedom (vs. Corseting), and Social Power (vs. Disempowerment and Disconnection). - Examines the construct of embodiment and its theoretical development - Explores the social experiences that shape girls throughout development - Recognizes the importance of the body and sexuality - Includes narratives by girls and young women on how they inhabit their bodies - Invites scholars and health professionals to critically reflect on the body journeys of diverse girls and women - Addresses the advancement of feminist, social critical and psychological theory, as well as implications to practice—both therapy and health promotion

Waging the Cold War's ideological battles on the gridiron