The Arts
Borderline bodies in art and visual culture
Unsettling identity and place since 1800
by Keren Hammerschlag, Natasha Ruiz-Gómez, Tania Anne Cleaves
Description
Borderline bodies offers original interpretations of visual representations of human bodies as bounded and unbounded, fortified and permeable, mobile and static-subject to borders and able to traverse and challenge them. It also takes as its focus images and objects that might be considered 'borderline' because they sit at the intersection of disciplines or sit outside accepted notions of what constitutes serious 'art.'
By mapping the ways human bodies traverse borders and straddle-even dismantle-categories, this volume's essays approach afresh the relationship of bodies to traditional modes of representation, especially in art and medicine, and encourage us to think anew about how we understand the relationship between human corporeality, identity and place. Critical transdisciplinary and transnational analyses of objects and images from a range of geographies shed new light on the themes of: bodies and identity; typologies of the body; racialised bodies; 'normal' and 'abnormal' bodies; encounters between bodies; bodies in transition; bodies and mobility; and the bounded and unbounded human body. The outcome is a fresh approach to depictions of the human body produced for the purposes of artistic and medical education, aesthetic edification, and scientific and professional advancement, which disrupts assumptions about the normative human body perpetuated through Western image-making traditions.
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Albania, Algeria, Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Canada, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, China, Colombia, Comoros, Congo [DRC], Congo, Republic of the, Costa Rica, Ivory Coast, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Djibouti, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Estonia, Ethiopia, Faroe Islands, Finland, France, French Guiana, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Honduras, Hongkong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kuwait, Latvia, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, China, Macedonia [FYROM], Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Mali, Malta, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mayotte, Mexico, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Reunion, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Helena, Sao Tome and Principe, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Somalia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tokelau, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Venezuela, Vietnam, Western Sahara, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Sudan, Cyprus, Palestine, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Liechtenstein, Azerbaijan, Jamaica, Kyrgyzstan, Dominican Republic, Myanmar, Monaco
Endorsements
'This book signals a transgressive new corporeal turn - a postcolonial materialism - in the borderspaces of health humanities.' -Warwick Anderson, author of Intolerant Bodies and Spectacles of Waste 'This groundbreaking volume of interdisciplinary visual studies provides wide-ranging analyses of the complex cultures of Borderline bodies across our globalised world.' -Anthea Callen, University of Nottingham 'Borderline bodies develops innovative conceptual tools for studying representations relating to multiply-marginalised bodies.' -Roger Nelson, Nanyang Technological University Borderline bodies offers original interpretations of visual representations of human bodies as bounded and unbounded, fortified and permeable, mobile and static-subject to borders and able to traverse and challenge them. Its focus is images and objects of human bodies, made since 1800, that might be considered 'borderline': the threshold that marks out and sits between national, ethnic, physical, psychological, geographic or temporal categories. These categories also include those constructed by scholars because they sit at the intersection of disciplines or sit outside accepted notions of what constitutes 'art.' By mapping the ways human bodies traverse borders and straddle categories, this volume's essays approach anew the relationship of bodies to traditional modes of representation, especially in art and medicine, and encourage us to think differently about how we understand the relationship between human corporeality, identity and place. The outcome is a fresh approach to depictions of the human body produced for the purposes of artistic and medical education, aesthetic edification, and scientific and professional advancement, which disrupts assumptions about the normative human body perpetuated through Western image-making traditions.
Reviews
'This book signals a transgressive new corporeal turn - a postcolonial materialism - in the borderspaces of health humanities.' -Warwick Anderson, author of Intolerant Bodies and Spectacles of Waste 'This groundbreaking volume of interdisciplinary visual studies provides wide-ranging analyses of the complex cultures of Borderline bodies across our globalised world.' -Anthea Callen, University of Nottingham 'Borderline bodies develops innovative conceptual tools for studying representations relating to multiply-marginalised bodies.' -Roger Nelson, Nanyang Technological University Borderline bodies offers original interpretations of visual representations of human bodies as bounded and unbounded, fortified and permeable, mobile and static-subject to borders and able to traverse and challenge them. Its focus is images and objects of human bodies, made since 1800, that might be considered 'borderline': the threshold that marks out and sits between national, ethnic, physical, psychological, geographic or temporal categories. These categories also include those constructed by scholars because they sit at the intersection of disciplines or sit outside accepted notions of what constitutes 'art.' By mapping the ways human bodies traverse borders and straddle categories, this volume's essays approach anew the relationship of bodies to traditional modes of representation, especially in art and medicine, and encourage us to think differently about how we understand the relationship between human corporeality, identity and place. The outcome is a fresh approach to depictions of the human body produced for the purposes of artistic and medical education, aesthetic edification, and scientific and professional advancement, which disrupts assumptions about the normative human body perpetuated through Western image-making traditions.
Author Biography
Keren Rosa Hammerschlag is Senior Lecturer in Art History and Curatorship at the Australian National University Natasha Ruiz-Gómez is a Senior Lecturer in Art History at the University of Essex Tania Cleaves (née Woloshyn) is an alternative-academic and Research Development Manager at the University of Nottingham
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Manchester University Press
Manchester University Press is a leading UK publisher known for excellent research in the humanities and social sciences.
View all titlesBibliographic Information
- Publisher Manchester University Press
- Publication Date June 2026
- Orginal LanguageEnglish
- ISBN/Identifier 9781526182722 / 1526182726
- Publication Country or regionUnited Kingdom
- FormatPrint PDF
- Pages320
- ReadershipGeneral/trade; College/higher education; Professional and scholarly
- Publish StatusPublished
- Dimensions240 X 170 mm
- Biblio NotesDerived from Proprietary 6346
- Reference Code16931
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