Body-Representation & the Construction of Visual Meanings: a few interpretations

Abstract

This paper focuses on the body-image discourses currently present in society as I felt it was important to propose a clear notion of the state of the subject today. Positioned in the interface between culture and body, the emphasis on the meanings of body (re)presentations is important since the ways of representing the body have always been implicitly linked with vision, language, perception, cognition, identity, social and cultural involvement, legitimation, difference and plasticity, providing incredible material for social researchers to work with. The associated interpretations, moreover, fall within the aims of social theory and culture. Thus this paper looks at the original – and always interesting – field of body-representations and the implications on the level of their visual meaning, uncovering questions and specific realities usually accepted as natural, though they are in fact naturalized. It enhances the use of discourse and visual analysis to uncover an understanding of those realities and meanings.