Helen Fowle writes
>>It occurs to me that the experiences of quadriplegics
>>may provide some information...
> There is quite a good book on this very topic written by Wendy Seymour, Its
> called Remaking the Body (Routledge) and is an ethnographic study of
> quadraplegics and how they have had to redefine their self to cope with
> spinal injury and its effects. It's a good read and shows clearly how
> one's sense of self is intimately connected with one's body. When these
> people lost particular abilities and functions, they had to reevaluate
> their selfs, both in the way they now saw themsleves, and how others saw
> them.
Good, this is choice information. I would next like to know
if they in retrospect considered the transformation into a
quadraplegic to be a form of death. My prediction would be
that they'd answer "no", no more than a rascally teen might
say of his induction into boot camp; just a strange transformation,
but not a real threat to existence or identity. But I could be wrong.
> Something that hasn't been mentioned particularly is the importance of
> other people to our sense of self. We define who we by what we look like,
> what we do, from experience and from our interactions with others -
> modifying our bodies will obviously have a profound effect on our sense of
> self, not just becuase of how we know we look and feel, but others
> opinions are also important to us. Some may say that they don't care what
> others think....but I think the majority of us do...maybe not.
Evidently some of us will be more affected than others by changes
in what we look like. I suggest that we consult the very elderly
on this matter, who no longer resemble themselves at age 20 at all.
Moreover, they now have much differently functioning bodies.
However, again, my personal experience suggests that far from
thinking that their selfs have changed, they regard themselves
as being trapped in strangely old and non-functioning bodies.
At least that's what my father said; and at age 53, that's the
way it's starting to seem to me too. One is reminded of the
obese person who shrieked, "Help! I am a thin person trapped
in this enormous fat body. Someone must help me!".
If I am correct in the above paragraphs, then the next question
must arise for me and those who agree with me, is, where are
people getting all these strange ideas about body image? Has
something in our culture recently changed?
Lee Corbin
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