The body as discursive surface: somatic rhetoric as the speaking of the unspoken¶

Theory · All theories
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

Drawing on postmodern body theorists (Butler, Bell, Irigaray, Raschke), the paper treats the body not as a passive biological agent but as a discursive surface that culture writes upon. When verbal response to conflict is blocked, the body speaks rhetorically through illness, hysteria, self-mutilation, or disordered eating. The paper applies this account to the WPA body, reading illness as a semio-text on which conflict is inscribed, and cites Lyotard's differend and Raschke's "writhing articulation" as its theoretical anchors.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Verbal response must be dangerous, denied, or unattainable for the corporeal body to speak in place of words

Constraints¶

• The author warns that essentializing the body is a danger when speaking of physical tropes on real bodies and states that essentializing is not her intent

Target Learners¶

• Writing Program Administrators in higher education

Target Learning Objectives¶

• Understanding and responding constructively to professional conflict in writing program administration

Claims¶

Related Theories¶

Examples¶

• Exploit marginalized difference through mimetic and disruptive readings (Irigaray's mime, Bell's philosophical clitoris) rather than expressing conflict as illness

Key Sources¶

• Gradin, Sherrie. (1998). Inscribing Our Work as WPAs: Gendered Bodies and Conflict as Physical Trope. ERIC. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED422588