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Theorizing the body: conceptions ofdisability, gender and normalityKamilla Peuravaara aa Department of Sociology , Uppsala University , Uppsala , SwedenPublished online: 16 Aug 2012.

To cite this article: Kamilla Peuravaara (2013) Theorizing the body: conceptions of disability,gender and normality, Disability & Society, 28:3, 408-417, DOI: 10.1080/09687599.2012.710010

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09687599.2012.710010

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STUDENT PERSPECTIVES

Theorizing the body: conceptions of disability, gender andnormality

Kamilla Peuravaara*

Department of Sociology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden

(Received 4 August 2011; final version received 18 June 2012)

The present article addresses different perspectives on the body in relation toconceptions of normality. It shows how a body perspective can be taken intoaccount from an individual perspective without losing a structural perspective.This is accomplished using the phenomenological conceptions the lived bodyand the body as situated. This article is part of a sociological qualitative inter-view study, focusing on disability, identity, and gender, and specifically on con-ceptions of the body and gender, as experienced by Swedish young womenlabeled as having an intellectual impairment.

Keywords: personal experiences; body; disability; gender; normality

Points of interest

• By looking at the personal experiences of some young women labeled withintellectual impairment, this article explores how the social body can be theo-rized from an individual perspective without losing the social discriminatingstructures found in sexist and disablist societies.

• This article illustrates how the body is connected to conceptions of disability,gender and normality.

• This article illustrates different ways of constructing the body, which can beinterrelated and discussed as aspects of the lived body.

• This article illustrates the importance of including conceptions of the bodywhen theorizing identity.

• The importance of exploring these issues and relations further, not leastempirically, is highlighted. Such an exploration is needed to further our under-standing of personal experiences and opinions of conceptions of the body,with an emphasis on disability, gender and normality.

Introduction

When questions referring to having a sense of belonging and pride were discussed,one of the participants, Pamela (all participant names are fictitious), expressed thefollowing:

*Email: Kamilla.Peuravaara@soc.uu.se

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Like I was studying with the others [at regular high school]. I felt it because I had alaptop in my hand, and it felt so awesome to hold a laptop and walk among the stu-dents, it was so, wow! Really nice! However, here [in the special class] we don’t haveany laptops, but the others have them … I’m so happy when I hang around with Taraand her friends because they’re attending regular high school now, and they dress likethey are doing it as well, and it’s really good, because when I’m with them, peoplelook and smile at me like I’m not as stupid as they first thought I was. They think thatpeople who attend a special class are a bit weird, so, when I hang around with theothers, I get lots of smiles. It was super-nice, and it boosted my self-esteem, actually,I’m really serious … it was very nice.// when I’m in this special class, I feel muchbetter being with the others [at regular high school] because they’re normal people, soto speak … and now Tara, a friend of mine … she used to look like a teacher, butnow she stands out in another way, she dresses much better, she has started wearingmake-up and I just … wow, what a change!

The above quote is from Pamela, a participant in the present qualitative sociologicalstudy that focuses on conceptions of the body and gender among Swedish youngwomen, between 17 and 20 years of age, with an intellectual impairment. Pamela’spersonal experience with regard to passing as a fashionable young woman addressesa problem – the lack of perspectives on the social body – that can increase ourunderstanding of the intersections of disability, gender, and the body. I wish tohighlight the importance of exploring conceptions of the body and femininity in fur-thering our understanding of notions of normality and constructions of identity.According to Pamela, having a laptop and being seen in the company of Tara, whoattends the regular high school, create normality, which can be interpreted as Pam-ela experiencing acceptance as a young woman; that is, being the same as a non-disabled young woman. Walking with the laptop in hand, Pamela meets friendlierfaces, and this experience can be understood as counteracting the sense of beingseen as ‘the other’. Pamela’s personal accounts and experiences add new perspec-tives on theorizing the body, which include intersections of norms related to (dis)ability and gender.

The present article illustrates some aspects of constructing the body. The aimis to contribute to an understanding, in the areas of sociology of the body anddisability studies, of conceptions and constructions of the body as a part of con-structing identities.

The empirical data in the present article consist of group interviews as well asindividual interviews with 12 Swedish young women who attend a special classwithin the Swedish school system. Inspired by participatory research (for example,Walmsley and Johnson 2003), the young women actively participated in the con-struction of the interview themes, all within the overarching research topic of con-ceptions of the body and femininity. This means I had no pre-defined researchthemes upon entering the field. Instead, they were constructed together in the focusgroup interviews with the young women. The empirical data in this article are fromthe individual interviews.

Previous research has illustrated the need to explore embodiment using a phe-nomenological approach (Paterson and Hughes 1999). The article focuses on thephenomenological concept of the lived body, and I discuss the body in relation toconceptions of normality and deviancy. The article further addresses how we cantheorize social bodies from an individual perspective – that is, based on the partici-pating young women’s personal experiences – without losing the context and socialstructures.

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I will first provide a short illustration of previous research on the body. Then Iwill discuss four perspectives on the body, which can be seen as interrelated. I con-clude with a discussion of how the different ways of constructing bodies are relatedto conceptions of normality. The importance of exploring these issues and relationsfurther, not least empirically, is highlighted.

Background

In the 1980s, the sociology of the body began to attract attention in sociological stud-ies (Turner 1984). Norbert Elias (1994) understands the body as playing an importantpart in the civilizing process. During the same period, Michel Foucault (1977) studiedhow bodies were being disciplined. It has been argued that the body perspective waslost in disability studies at the same time as it became fashionable in sociology(Hughes and Paterson 1997). The body perspective was primarily brought into disabil-ity studies by feminist researchers, through research adhering to social models (forexample, Corker 1998b; French 1993; Thomas 1999; Tremain 2002).

Previous research focusing on women with intellectual impairments has shownthat, in these women’s experience, it is not being categorized as having an intellec-tual impairment that is necessarily the main problem with regard to experiencingdiscrimination, but rather that problems stem from social and economic discrimina-tion (Traustadóttir and Johnson 2000). Conceptions of bodies are closely related tosocietal structures. One of the participants, Lisa, describes how students from theregular high school laugh at her and her classmates, who attend special classes, andhow their behavior affects her everyday life at school. Lisa experiences the follow-ing situation in the halls at school. This experience is related to discriminatingstructures that restrict her body, in the sense of restricting her access to certain areasat school, owing to the risk of being laughed at and ridiculed in these areas:

When we [students attending a special class] pass other classrooms, we never go ingroups. We go alone instead to avoid being seen as a group that is special. Often wego alone, or with just one more person. Everyone thinks it’s so embarrassing to walkin a larger group, and I also feel that way. I still do. I don’t want to be in the halls,where there are regular classes, because then they say: ‘She’s one of those in a specialclass’! (Lisa)

During industrialization, when the localization of work shifted from beingmainly in the home to the factories, many disabled people were excluded from theworkforce owing to the norms regarding production (Oliver 1990). This new tech-nology of production-line work led to the differentiation of bodies based on concep-tions of bodily normality. Some bodies were not seen as physically able enough toperform certain tasks (Davis 1999). Previous research on the body has illustratedthe meaning of the social body and described the body as a surface, a language, amyth or as a stage (Johannisson 1997). Research has been done on the body in rela-tion to health among women with physical impairments (Tighe 2001), and healthand control among young women with intellectual impairment (McCarthy 1998).Previous research has also described conceptions of the ideal body among physi-cally disabled young women and men (Bengs 2007). The body has also been dis-cussed in relation to conceptions of the ideal body among women with intellectualimpairments, who shared experiences of being satisfied with their physical

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appearance, and with women with physical impairments, who experienced theirbodies as deficient in relation to conceptions of the ideal body, which is strong andcontrolled (Barron 2004). I explore these issues – that is, the body as a surface –further and from different perspectives, including the lived and experienced body.

Four perspectives on the body

Four perspectives on the body will be discussed. These four perspectives are inter-related. The underlying notion here is that the body is constructed, but has real con-sequences for our bodies and our selves, because we are living in a racialized andgendered (Bordo 1998) as well as heteronormative and able-bodied world (McRuer2006). The body is a social construction; that is, a construction that structures whatcounts as a ‘real’ body within a culture (Bordo 1998). The conception of ‘realbodies’ is closely related to conceptions of normality; that is, what are understoodas ideal bodies in a specific time, context and culture. One aspect of conceptions ofthe ‘natural body’ concerns the body as a fixed object; that is, an understanding ofthe body as not changeable.

The body as changeable

Historically, our understanding of the body has been limited to the fields of biologyand medicine. The biological body has been problematized in the sociology of thebody, as well as in disability studies. In everyday discourse, the biological body isdepicted as a fixed, invariant object, based on conceptions of the body and genderas biologically divergent. Biological sex differences are understood as somethingnatural, stable and unchanging. According to this conception, the biological body ismerely something we are born with, and thus doomed to live with forever; and atthe same time, it is something we cannot live without. Today, the ‘natural body’can be described as having lost some of its status and value owing to technologicaldevelopments (Birke 2000; Fausto-Sterling 2003).

Technological developments demand new ways of thinking about conceptions ofa stable and fixed biological body. Anne Balsamo (1999) shows how bodies are notfixed or given and biologically separated by gender, as is taken for granted in thedaily discourse. Balsamo (1999) gives a concrete example of this, discussing howheart transplants can be done regardless of whether the transplant is a man’s, awoman’s, or an animal’s heart. Technological developments can be one way of dis-cussing how the body can be controlled. Oscar Pistorius, a sprinter competing inthe Paralympics, is an example of a person for whom technology has become a partof the body. Pistorius runs with the aid of artificial legs, giving him the nicknamethe ‘blade runner’ (for example, Swartz and Watermeyer 2008). In Pistorius’ case,it is interesting that the artificial legs have not been accepted as a part of his body.Hence Pistorius has not been allowed to compete in the regular Olympics, as hisartificial legs are viewed as an advantage. Leslie Swartz and Brian Watermeyer(2008) problematize disabled people’s history of not being accepted as humans;they argue that the same thing is happening to Pistorious, who is not allowed tocompete with non-disabled athletes because he is presumed to have a non-humanadvantage. John Law and Ingunn Moser (2007) provide another example of tech-nology becoming part of the body, in the life-story of a young woman named Liv.Liv is severely disabled and dependent on technology to eat, sit, move and

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communicate. It is interesting, however, that in Pamela’s personal account technol-ogy (carrying a laptop) creates normality, while Pistorious is described as non-human or superhuman. This tension with regard to the notion of normality and theboundaries of the body is important to explore further when investigating construc-tions of normality and conceptions of the body. Another example of technologicallycreated ‘normality’ is cochlear implants, which constitute a controversial develop-ment. There is a great deal of difference with regard to how these implants are val-ued (for example, Corker 1998a; Sparrow 2010).

Beauty cosmetic surgery has been discussed as another way of controlling thebody, in a culture focused on having ‘the right looks’ (Morgan 1998). In her article,Kathryn Paulu Morgan discusses the phenomenon of taking control of one’s ownbody through cosmetic surgery, despite the risk of dying under the knife. Morganasks whether this is a sign of liberation or oppression, or both. In contemporarysociety, restored youth, permanent beauty and conceptions of normality throughcosmetic surgery are no longer a question of ‘whether’, but rather a question of‘what’ and ‘how much’. Cosmetic surgery is becoming more common, and thiscould lead to more women (and men) who do not choose surgery being categorizedas ‘ugly’ and ‘old’ in relation to surgically created ideals of beauty and youth. Ithas been argued that the ordinary will become ‘ugly’ when: ‘the technologicalbeauty imperative and the pathological inversion of the normal are coercing moreand more women to “choose cosmetic surgery”’ (Morgan 1998, 274). In contrast(or not?) to previous discussions of cosmetic surgery is the body artist Orlan, whoopposes conceptions of beauty ideals by, for instance, enlarging her nose in waysthat create features characterized as ‘ugly’. Orlan decorates the operating rooms,takes pictures of and videotapes the operations, and describes it as her (thepatient’s) party. Plastic surgery, according to Orlan, is about taking control of yourown body, opposing the norm of what is beautiful (Davis 1999), and resisting con-ceptions of bodily normality (Garland-Thomson 2004). Conceptions of how thebody should look esthetically are closely related to conceptions of bodily normalityand the idea of the ideal body.

The ideal body

According to conceptions of normality, with regard to the ideal body, bodilyperfection is a myth that has its roots in ancient Greece (Dale Stone 1995). It seemsas though this myth is still prevailing, although it takes on other forms. Conceptionsof the ideal body are changing, some of them rapidly, while others are more stable.But they also vary across societies, cultures, time and place. Conceptions of bodilynormality constantly exist as a ‘measuring stick’. I argue that, in a consumer cul-ture, this ‘measuring stick’ is constantly present; that is, as a woman (or a man)you are never ‘free from’ images of bodily normality. The ideal body is closelyconnected to a consumer culture, meaning that individuals are consuming their iden-tity (Bauman 2008; Wendell 1996). Part of individuals’ consumption of their identi-ties involves consuming their bodies, in the sense that Angela McRobbie (2007)invokes when she calls this consumerism culture the postmodernistic masquerade,and in the sense that beauty and fashion replace other former patriarchal hierarchies.The body is both an instrument and an object of consumerism, and the body is usedto consuming – to being fed, clothed, and so forth, and ‘the body sees an image,idealizes it, and seeks to become the image of that image’ (Frank 1997, 44). Bodily

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appearances are closely linked to cultural ideals of the body and, in line with theidealization of the body, one consequence is that other bodies are not wanted. Themodern consumer culture is part of idealizing the body as something controlled,strong and fast (Wendell 1996). Although conceptions of the ideal body are chang-ing, the fact that the constructed ideal body is related to what is understood asyouthful remains a constant. In order to understand conceptions of the ideal body, itis not enough to only look at youth as an isolated ideal. The construction of beinga female child and becoming a young woman is a gendered process. Anorexia nerv-osa has been described as way to confront this; that is, an attempt to become ahuman being rather than a sexed object (Björk 1999). It has also been described asa disease caused by cultural explanations and as closely connected to conceptionsof femininity (Bordo 1998). The becoming of what is understood as a youngwoman may vary across time, place and context. Conceptions of the body are pres-ent in all social contexts and are a factor with regard to social class, gender andincome, which in turn influence how the body is dressed. Thus, clothes are morethan only a surface; they are a presentation of the self and part of the expression ofidentity (Entwistle 2000). Lisa, one of the participants, points out that what isunderstood as fashionable varies over time. Lisa explains how, today, some visualimpairments are trendy, and provides an example of enhancement of an impairmentin contemporary society:

It’s like wearing glasses, before, you could not wear them because it was like ‘heckno’, but now people have fake glasses, I think it has to do with that times are chang-ing, today no one looks down on people who wear glasses, like before, so well …people make it more visible, kind of.

The ideal body can also be understood as a so-called ‘neutral’ body. Concep-tions of normality have influenced beauty ideals in modernity, where beauty andbeing fashionable imply looking ‘normal’ and ‘neutral’, which means not lookingdisabled, queer, fat, ugly, ethnic or raced (Garland-Thomson 2004, 83). This is alsoreflected in aesthetic surgery: ‘The purpose of aesthetic surgery, as well as thecostuming of power, is not to appear unique – or to “be yourself”, as the advertise-ments endlessly promise – but rather not to be conspicuous, not to look different’(Garland-Thomson 2004, 83). Another example, from ‘a queer perspective’, ofbodily performativity in endeavors to achieve the ‘real me’ with aesthetic surgery isto amputate body parts that are fully functional (Stryker and Sullivan 2009).

Conceptions of the ideal body are thus related to conceptions of bodily normal-ity, and the process of understanding what the ideal body entails can be describedas an individual project. The individual project is always related to social norms.

The body as an individual project

Conceptions of the body are thus related to social norms. As mentioned earlier, con-ceptions of a healthy body are closely related to the ideal, youthful body. It is up tothe individual to control her/his own body by adhering to fashion as well as dieting,and to be his/her own body’s gatekeeper. In this sense, the body can be describedas an individual project. Examples of this are illustrated in previous research onhow the body is individualized in contemporary society. Individualizing the body incontemporary society involves blaming the individual for not ‘taking care of’ her/

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his body (Barron 2004). We can use our bodies, or our bodies are used, to presentour self-images by means of, for instance, diet, clothes, microsurgery, body implantspharmaceuticals, and so forth. We ‘read’ people based on their physical appearance,including eye color and the shape of the nose, while we, at the same time, createan identity by behaving and dressing in accordance with a particular style and fash-ion (Finkelstein 2002). In the twentieth century, conceptions of beauty changedfrom discipline of the outside to also include a discipline from the inside (Entwistle2009). The corset symbolizes the difference. The discipline previously representedby the corset wearer has now been replaced by a new form of discipline that comesfrom within the person, the dieting and exercising enforced by self-discipline. Thus,beauty is now also associated with inner control (Entwistle 2009). The corset,which according to Rosemarie Garland-Thomson (2004) paradoxically disableswomen’s bodies, has similarities with the braces that correct scoliosis, braces thatdiscipline the body to conform to gender and able norms by enforcing standardizedfemale forms (Garland-Thomson 2004). This illustrates that parallels exist betweenhealth norms and norms of femininity. Bodies are used to present our self-imagesfrom the perspective of ‘the lived body’, which includes ‘the feeling body’ and thebody as a situation.

The lived body and the body as a situation

Conceptions of the body as a fixed object, the ideal body and the body as a projectare interrelated, and illustrate some aspects of the lived body. Theorizing the bodyand its meaning in the daily lives of young women can be done in several ways.The phenomenological concept of the lived body takes into account a non-distinc-tion of what is understood as the biological and social body. The lived body alsotakes into account the acting and feeling body as a subject, which, at the same time,is part of its history. The lived body is part of society without being a mere productof society (Moi 2005). The lived body exemplifies the importance of the individ-ual’s experience without denying society’s impact on individuals and their bodies.In this sense, the body can be shaped by the different roles we perform on a dailybasis (Heinämaa 1998). Toril Moi (2005) uses this approach when she sheds lighton Simone de Beauvoir’s analysis, in combination with Merleau-Ponty, of the gen-dered body as a situation, which she sees as a sophisticated alternative to currentgender theories. The body is a situation that is always part of the lived experience.In this sense, the body can never be an object, unless you are dead. Lived experi-ence is described as a central concept, and it refers to the ways in which an individ-ual gives meaning to her/his social context and actions. The concept also includesthe subject’s freedom, although the lived experience is not only decided by thesocial context it is part of, as we are always situated and the situation is alwayschanging, meaning that the lived experience is changing (Moi 2005). However, it isimportant to bear in mind that the world can be experienced in different waysdepending on individual, social and current conceptions of bodies.

Moi (2005) stresses the importance of taking into account different bodies, andpoints out that which body ‘you travel with’ in the world is of relevance. If thebody is, for example, unwell or aching, the world will very probably not be experi-enced in the same way as when the body is physically healthy or athletically fit.The world can be experienced in different ways, not only related to conceptions ofability and disability but also related to, for instance, ‘race’, gender, sexuality and

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age (for example, Ahmed 2006). This has to do with how individuals experiencethemselves and what is expected in specific cultural contexts.

Intersections of disability, femininity and the body

Pamela’s personal account, which introduced the present article, illustrates how thebody is situated, which implies becoming and being made visible in a certain way,depending on the context. It also exemplifies the lived experience of being labeledwith an intellectual impairment as a young woman of today, and the strategies usedto become visible as a young woman, similar to a non-disabled young woman,through the malleable body and extensions of the body. Pamela dresses in a waythat is understood as feminine, and carries a technical device (a laptop), to pass asa fashionable and what she views as an intellectually able young woman. Accordingto Pamela, this ‘normality’ is something desirable. Pamela also illustrates how tech-nology becomes part of her body and creates normality, in the sense that has beendiscussed earlier (e.g. regarding Pistorious and Liv). In Pamela’s case, the laptopcan be understood as becoming part of her body, and the laptop creates ‘normality’.Holding the laptop and walking through the corridors of the regular classes changesthe way Pamela experiences being looked at, as well as how she experiences herselfand her body. This is described by Pamela as an example of how she blends in as ayoung woman of today, as she said in the interview; a way to become ‘neutral’ as aperson and to pass as a non-disabled, feminine, young and modern woman. ToPamela, this means wearing make-up and dressing in a way that is understood asfeminine. These examples provided by the participating women highlight the impor-tance of integrating perspectives of disability and gender when exploring an under-standing of conceptions of the body, normality, and constructions of identities inrelation to ‘bodily agency’. However, the young women are molding their bodies,in different ways (e.g. through clothes, make-up and technical devices), in order topass as non-disabled, young fashionable women. Their practices are based on thefact that they live in a disablist and sexist society. These young women’s livedexperiences further our understanding of the complexity of the social body, not leastwith regard to conceptions of normality.

Conclusion

In the present article, I have focused on possible ways of theorizing the social bodyfrom an individual as well as a structural perspective, in relation to conceptions ofdisability, gender and normality. The perspectives the body as changeable, the idealbody and the body as an individual project are interrelated, and illustrate differentdimensions of conceptions of the lived body. These bodily perspectives have beendiscussed in relation to what constitutes an understanding of bodily normality.

The body has attracted greater attention of late in both disability studies and thesociology of the body. But I argue that a deeper understanding of an integrating, ora so-called intersectional, perspective is needed. When discussing identity construc-tions in relation to conceptions of the body, considering disability and gender (forexample, Garland-Thomson 2004; Traustadóttir 2004) that helps to increase ourknowledge considering how bodies can be constructed, may also further our under-standing of identity construction (Shakespeare 2006). The body can play differentparts depending on the lived experience, as well as on the social, discriminating

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structures in sexist, disablist and ageist societies. It is thus of value to investigateand analyze these interrelated perspectives in order to further our understanding ofconstructions of identities and normality. I argue that this requires, as I have exem-plified above, that young women’s own voices be heard, as such an approachallows us to further our understanding of their personal experiences and conceptionsof the body, with an emphasis on disability, gender and normality. Current concep-tions of what is understood as ideals, with regard to a ‘natural’ body and a superfi-cial one, are changeable and complex. As Lisa so aptly put it: ‘It’s the superficialsurface that makes you memorable’.

AcknowledgementsThe author would like to thank the young women who participated in the study, and twoanonymous referees for their comments on a preliminary draft of the paper.

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