We know more about the physical body—how it begins, how it responds to illness, even how it decomposes—than ever before. Yet not all bodies are created equal, some bodies clearly count more than others, and some bodies are not recognized at all. In Missing Bodies, Monica J. Casper and Lisa Jean Moore explore the surveillance, manipulations, erasures, and visibility of the body in the twenty-first century. The authors examine bodies, both actual and symbolic, in a variety of arenas: pornography, fashion, sports, medicine, photography, cinema, sex work, labor, migration, medical tourism, and war. This new politics of visibility can lead to the overexposure of some bodies—Lance Armstrong, Jessica Lynch—and to the near invisibility of others—dead Iraqi civilians, illegal immigrants, the victims of HIV/AIDS and "natural" disasters.Missing Bodies presents a call for a new, engaged way of seeing and recovering bodies in a world that routinely, often strategically, obscures or erases them. It poses difficult, even startling questions: Why did it take so long for the United States media to begin telling stories about the "falling bodies" of 9/11? Why has the United States government refused to allow photographs or filming of flag-draped coffins carrying the bodies of soldiers who are dying in Iraq? Why are the bodies of girls and women so relentlessly sexualized? By examining the cultural politics at work in such disappearances and inclusions of the physical body the authors show how the social, medical and economic consequences of visibility can reward or undermine privilege in society.

Product Description: 2007 Choice Outstanding Academic TitleWinner of the Passing the Torch Award from the Center for Lesbian and Gay StudiesIt has been called sperm, semen, seed, cum, jizz, spunk, gentlemen's relish, and splooge. But however the “tacky, opaque liquid that comes out of the penis” is described, the very act of defining “sperm” and “semen” depends on your point of view...read more

For centuries the biological sciences have dissected, measured, and probed the human body as a product of nature. But from a feminist perspective, the human body is a social production. Human bodies are shaped and controlled by the norms and expectations of gendered social orders, and intersected by racial, class, religious, and age norms and expectations. The result is a gendered body produced for a gendered social world. In this concise text with readings, designed for undergraduate students, Judith Lorber and Lisa Jean Moore present feminist contributions to social and cultural studies of the human body, examining the construction of gendered bodies in different contexts. They argue that the ideology of the perfect body is a powerful means of social control for girls and boys, as well as for women and men. The authors show how children's bodies are gendered through games and sports--and shaped and modified throughout adulthood to meet social expectations. Gendered Bodies: Feminist Perspectives covers a broad range of topics, such as men's bodies and masculinity norms, third-wave feminist menstrual activism, transgender and intersex issues, the male pill, the controversies over male circumcision and ritual genital cutting of girls, disabilities, war wounds in Iraq, torture, and suicide bombers. Each chapter includes a list of key concepts, three readings, recommended books and articles, and Internet sources. For the instructor, the book includes class exercises and a list of films with relevant themes.