Lesson 12 - Deviant Bodies (Part One) PDF

Preview

Summary

Parnaby...

Description

Deviant Bodies (Part One) Goffman and Stigma (Revisited)  



Stigma – “a quality or attribute that is deeply discrediting and that has the power to interrupt social and personal relationships” Goffman argues that there are three main different kinds of stigma in life: o Blemish of character (part of your psychological profile/personality that stigmatizes you) o Abomination of the body (stigmatization based on physical attributes; will be looked at in more depth) o Tribal stigma (stigma based on your racial affiliation) There are two forms of the abomination of the body: o Physical incapacity (e.g., physical disability) – bodily impairments that limit your function as a human being  Blindness  Crippling diseases o Violation of aesthetic norms – breaching the norms pertaining to how people “ought” to look  Tattoos  Piercings

Physical Disability 

 

 



In the European middle ages, anyone with a visible physical disability was seen as an extension of the Devil’s work – this is because of the common belief that God made man in his image Young fetuses or individuals who were physically disabled would be treated with scorn and ridicule and, in extreme cases, would be killed We saw similar logic in the late 19th-mid 20th century eugenics movement, in which the mentally and physically disabled were sterilized o A notorious example of this was the Nazi party sterilizing the physically disabled to eliminate them from the Aryan race, because they were “unfit” for it To this day, the physically disabled remain stigmatized (staring, whispering, etc.) In 2015, Goode looked at contemporary people and their feelings towards those with a physical disability through the “social distancing scale” o 1 – if you had your way, you would put those with physical disabilities to death; 8 – you are willing to have the physically disabled as kin o Most North Americans scored in the high 3s/low 4s, meaning that they would prefer their social distance Why are they stigmatized? o In Western society, “normal” bodies are the dominant construct and anything less than that is deemed deviant







o Aesthetic norms cause us to see the physically disabled as displeasing or unappealing; we are also at odds with individuals who are unable to physically operate in a way that we think is normal (so we try to treat them, fix them, etc.) o Hahn (1988) argued that the presence of a physically disabled body to a “normal” person creates a sense of anxiety in the normal person’s head because they are coming face-to-face with the realization that humanity is fragile and understanding that the physically disabled person could have been them  Existential anxiety/fear  Hahn believed that to fix this, able-bodied individuals should come into more frequent contact with disabled individuals o All of this leads those with physical disabilities to be socially, politically, and economically excluded How do the physically disabled manage their stigma so that they can interact with “normal” society more effectively? o Taub, McLorg, and Fanflik (2004) noticed that young men, and especially young women, have the unique ability to deflect attention away from their disability through humour, excessive cheerfulness, and kindness – this is all done consciously and strategically to minimize social disruption o Edgerton (1967) noted that they used demonstrations of ability to normalize themselves – they will strategically and clearly go out of their way to prove that they can do what you can do (a “cloak of competence”) o Taub et al. argued that since “normals” sometimes imply that physically disabled people are “parasites” or “malingerers”, the disabled have to manage this moral stigma as well (blemish of character)  They will dis-identify from the assumption being cast upon them  They will also sometimes engage in advocacy – they will take this moral stigma up as a cause o “Agency” – the ability to manage and resist stigma The disability rights movement since the 1990s have been engaging in tertiary deviance by fighting for dignity, respect, and equal access to resources – this kind of advocacy seeks to transform norms and values through education Efforts at tertiary deviance typically are effective once the victims are no longer understood to be morally responsible for their condition; if you have a physical disability that was partially your fault (e.g., athletes), society will not look at you so graciously when you engage in tertiary deviance o No moral responsibility = typically more success through policy changes, societal paradigm shifts, etc.

Modified Bodies 

In the late 19th and early 20th century, circus owners were going out of their way to find “primitives” and force them to go on tour with them (as part of a freak show)











In the 1920s-1950s, tattoo parlors started to develop, catering to working class North Americans (particularly those returning from the war, but not exclusively) o It became clear that there was an obvious social class relationship to tattoos (the lower class/working class) In the 1950s-1970s, we first started to see tattoos as identifying one’s sub-cultures (e.g., biker gangs, prison populations, etc.) – they used tattoos to express their disdain to conformity and the dominant culture In the 1980s-1990s, we started to see tattoos related to social movement (e.g., gay rights movement, feminist movement) – the tattoos would symbolize their belief system and what they thought was important Between the 1990s and to the present, tattoos gained widespread popularity o The 1990s are known in sociology as the golden age of tattoos o Tattoos exploded among the North American middle class (and sometimes even the upper class) o One of the dominant explanations is that the Hollywood popular culture started to glorify tattoos (celebrities got tattoos and showed them off) o Tattoos crossed racial, ethnic, gender, and economic lines o 40% of Americans between 26-40 have a tattoo (most of it occurring post-1990s) The research has become preoccupied with understanding why people get tattoos – the reasons are myriad: o Group affiliation, right of passage (an important transition into adulthood or, more generally, an important milestone in life), art/beauty, spirituality, cultural criticism...