Body+social Theory

"For those who are confused as to the nature of the major arguments and why they might be important, help is at hand with this book." --LTD Book Review The two quotes below are from the same journal, but different reviewers. You do not have to list the name of the reviewer when using them in ads. I just did that so there would not be any confusion. "This is a useful, readable, and timely volume, that I would strongly recommend both for courses on the sociology of the body and for courses on social theory. It offers a central and personal theme that permeates and integrates the work of such major twentieth century theorists as Douglass, Goffman, Foucault, Bordieu, and Giddens." --Life Course "Scholars and teachers can be grateful to Chris Shilling for an incisive survey of how the body motivates contemporary social theory and social theory's various contributions to understanding the body. Shilling does not attempt a new theory of the body, but he organizes a wide range of sociological work into a cohesive overview. He offers lucid summaries of others' theories, valuable critiques of different theorists, and useful criteria for future theorizing about the body. His book should enjoy a wide use as a core text in sociology of the body courses, or as a supplementary text in social theory or social psychology courses. . . . The Body and Social Theory is most welcome." --Arthur Frank, University of Calgary in Body and Society "Chris Shilling's The Body and Social Theory is a thoughtful, readable, and, in places, quite persuasive text. . . . It is a provocative text which covers a large theoretical terrain. Moreover, it both introduces a range of contemporary theories on embodiment and marks out its own (cogent) position within them. For this reason it is sure to stand out amongst texts on embodiment for some time to come." --Nick Crossley, University of Sheffield in Body and Society "[There is] much to promote debate about the relationship between social theory and empirical research on embodiment, and Shilling's overview of literatures in which the body and embodiment assume prominence is, in general, user-friendly. . . . Provides a good overview of Bourdieu and a nice little summary of Foucault's work--Foucault in five pages is itself quite an achievement!" --Basil Blackwell Ltd./Editorial Board "The Body and Social Theory cleverly steers between naturalistic and constructionist accounts of the body's sexuality, shaping, medicalization, and civilization to treat the body within the problematic of modernity (control and uncertainty). Through succinct analyses of the work of Turner, Giddens, Goffman, Berger, Foucault, Bourdieu, and Elias, Chris Shilling shows how the body's symbolic capital is employed to invest class, ethnicity, gender, and race with their distinctive aesthetics. This is an invaluable guide to social studies of body behavior." --John O'Neill, York University, Toronto "This is a useful, readable and timely volume, which I would strongly recommend both for courses on the sociology of the body and for courses on social theory. It offers a central and personal theme that permeates and integrates the work of such major twenieth century theorists as Douglas, Goffman, Foucault, Bourdieu and Giddens, not only with each other, but also with somatic theorists like Elias, Turner and Frank. Futhermore, it provides a fresh perspective on such issues as age, color, class, gender, and health, which are, after all, the stuff of sociology and of life itself." --Anthony Synnott in Contemporary Sociology In recent years, contemporary societies have been characterized by a heightened attention to the body, expressed in the changing relation of individual identity to health, sexuality, and body image. Innovative and comprehensive, The Body and Social Theory provides a clear, critical analysis of the new sociShilling, Chris is the author of 'Body+social Theory' with ISBN 9780803985858 and ISBN 0803985851.