Transacting sites of the liminal bodily spaces
Abstract
This study focuses on liminal bodies and their delicate transaction with themselves and other people's bodies. More specifically, it explores the spatiality and discourses of the body dying; the body opened in surgery, or through MIRs, CATs, and sometimes in autopsies; the body preserved through the computerized images such as those created by the Visual Human Project; the metonymic body that continues to live in another body through organ replacement; the bodily parts cast in silver, and then abandoned in a museum. This study also analyzes the discourses of the contemporary body commissioned by the vast industry of mass-media. This type of body has started to direct itself toward frugal, almost furtive pleasures; consequently--unlike those seriously affected by illnesses--a body constantly guarded by fear eventually runs on empty, becomes a corps-déjà-vu, and thus moves toward different types of minimal and liminal topology. The primary works examined include memoirs (Marjorie Williams's "Hit by Lightning: A Cancer Memoir," Arthur W. Frank's At the Will of the Body: Reflections on Illness), films (Alejandro Amenábar's The Sea Inside, Akira Kurosawa's Ikiru), stories (Marisa Silver's "Night Train to Frankfurt"), visual artworks (as accomplished by Jo Spence, David Wojnarowicz, Félix Gonzales-Torres) and plays (Bryony Lavery's Last Easter, Paula Vogel's Baltimore Waltz, William Hoffman's As Is), which are read comparatively, namely as works positioned at the intersection between literature/visual art and social diaries.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Mix, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Comparative literature|Canadian literature|Fine arts|Theater|American literature|Motion pictures
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