Visibly queer: Body technologies and sexual politics

Journal/Book: Sociol Quart. 2000; 41: C/O Journals Division 2000 Center St, Ste 303, Berkeley, CA 94704-1223, USA. Univ Calif Press. 443-463.

Abstract: Queer body modification is a site for investigating the possibilities and limitations of agency in body practices. This article considers the use of new and recirculated body modification technologies-many of them modeled after practices of indigenous, non-Western groups - by members of gay, lesbian, and transgendered communities. Through presenting and interpreting the interview-gathered narratives of six body modifiers, I describe body modification as a practice imbued with agency by subjects. By creating anomalous bodies that provoke shock and consternation, body modifiers not only underscore the body's symbolic significance as a site of public identity but also conceive it as a resource for opposing (hetero) dominant culture. Body modification, even though it tests social tolerance, is not guaranteed in its subversive effects. I approach the narratives from a perspective informed by feminist poststructuralism and I understand body modifers' agency as limited by and constituted within regulatory regimes of power, such as heteronormativity, pathologization, and colonialism. I describe how such deployments engage symbols embedded in historic systems of representation and thus raise important questions regarding agency.

Note: Article Pitts V, CUNY Queens Coll, Dept Sociol, 65-30 Kissena Blvd, Flushing,NY 11367 USA

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