title: [The symbolic power of bodily secretions].
abstract: Are ethical and political questions discussed more in aesthetic than in social terms? Political debates in contemporary art are often expressed through the use of symbolic power structures that are related to bodily secretions and products. By visualizing the less delicate parts of the organic body, contemporary artists focus on the vulnerability of the human body and its illness and pain. If human suffering is aestheticized: is this a question of form or a question of creating a cultural cover-up? Bodily secretions are associated with a range of complex social and cultural meanings and symbols. Metaphors related to body products may function as markers of ethnic, religious, social and sexual differences. In postmodern cultural criticism, the symbolic power of body metaphors is of great importance.
authors.affiliation: Sosiologisk Institutt Fosswinckelsgate 6, 5007 Universitetet i Bergen. lise.isaksen@sos.uib.no
authors.forename: Lise Widding
authors.initials: LW
authors.lastname: Isaksen
mesh_terms: D012634:Bodily Secretions; D003469:Culture; D004954:Esthetics; D004992:Ethics, Medical; D006801:Humans; D019365:Metaphor; D010686:Philosophy, Medical; D011057:Politics; D012068:Religion and Medicine; D013561:Symbolism