Body Aesthetics OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, Spi OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, Spi
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OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi Body Aesthetics OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi Body Aesthetics edited by Sherri Irvin 1 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6D P, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © the several contributors 2016 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted First Edition published in 2016 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2015955745 ISBN 978–0–19–871677–8 Printed in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work. OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi This book is dedicated to the memory of Tobin Siebers (January 29, 1953–January 29, 2015), with gratitude for his outstanding scholarship on the aesthetics of disability. OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 06/24/2016, SPi Contents List of Illustrations ix List of Contributors xiii Introduction: Why Body Aesthetics? 1 Sherri Irvin Part I. Representation 1. Black Silhouettes on White Walls: Kara Walker’s Magic Lantern 15 Maria del Guadalupe Davidson 2. Taste in Bodies and Fat Oppression 37 A. W. Eaton 3. From “Little Brown Brothers” to “Queer Asian Wives”: Constructing the Asian Male Body 60 C. Winter Han Part II. Look 4. Appearance as a Feminist Issue 81 Deborah L. Rhode 5. A Tale of Two Olympians: Beauty, “Race,” Nation 94 Shirley Anne Tate 6. The Merrickites 110 Glenn Parsons 7. And Everything Nice 127 Stephen Davies Part III. Performance 8. In/Visible: Disability on the Stage 141 Tobin Siebers 9. Live, Body-Based Performance: An Account from the Field 153 Jill Sigman 10. Aesthetic Effortlessness 180 Barbara Gail Montero OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 06/24/2016, SPi viii contents 11. Misleading Aesthetic Norms of Beauty: Perceptual Sexism in Elite Women’s Sports 192 Peg Brand Weiser and Edward B. Weiser Part IV. Practice 12. Body Aesthetics and the Cultivation of Moral Virtues 225 Yuriko Saito 13. White Embodied Gazing, the Black Body as Disgust, and the Aesthetics of Un-Suturing 243 George Yancy 14. Somaesthetics and the Fine Art of Eating 261 Richard Shusterman 15. Sexual Desire, Inequality, and the Possibility of Transformation 281 Ann J. Cahill 16. Sex Objects and Sexy Subjects: A Feminist Reclamation of Sexiness 299 Sheila Lintott and Sherri Irvin Index 319 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 06/24/2016, SPi List of Illustrations 1.1 Renée Cox. The Yo Mama, 1993. 16 1.2 Unknown maker, French. Nude study of a Black Female, about 1855. 19 1.3 Map from Henry Rider Haggard’s novel King Solomon’s Mines. 23 1.4 Ernest Benecke and Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard. Zofia, Femme du Caire, 1853. 25 Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program. 1.5 Kara Walker. Detail of Camptown Ladies, 1998. 28 Artwork © Kara Walker; Courtesy of Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York. 1.6 Kara Walker. Detail of Gone, An Historical Romance of a Civil War as it Occurred between the Dusky Thighs of One Young Negress and Her Heart, 1994. 32 Artwork © Kara Walker; Courtesy of Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York. 1.7 Kara Walker. A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby, an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant, 2014. 33 Photo: Jason Wyche. Artwork © Kara Walker; Courtesy of Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York. 8.1 Film still of Mary Duffy in Vital Signs: Crip Culture Talks Back (1996), directed by Sharon Snyder and David Mitchell. Marquette, MI: Brace Yourself Productions. 150 9.1 Wafaa Bilal. Detail from Domestic Tension, performance, 2007. 157 Copyright Wafaa Bilal. Courtesy Driscoll Babcock Galleries. 9.2 Luminosity (originally performed by Marina Abramović, 1997), as reperformed by Jill Sigman. 159 Photo: Jonathan Muzikar © The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Digital Image © The Museum of Modern Art/Licensed by SCALA/Art Resource, NY. © 2015 Marina Abramović. Courtesy of Sean Kelly Gallery/(ARS), New York. 9.3 Dancers Sally Hess, Donna Costello, and Irene Hsi in the movement section of last days/first field (2013). 162 Photo by Rafael Gamo. 9.4 Dancers planting a field of kale seedlings during a performance of last days/first field (2013). 162 Photo by Rafael Gamo. OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 06/24/2016, SPi x List of Illustrations 9.5 Audience members eating kale salad and talking on the newly planted field in last days/first field (2013). 163 Photo by Rafael Gamo. 9.6 Jill Sigman setting out calf brains during Brain Song (2011). 164 Photo by Julie Lemberger. © Julie Lemberger 2011. 9.7 Sigman cradles two wrapped brains as an audience member looks on during Brain Song (2011). 165 Photo by Julie Lemberger. © Julie Lemberger 2011. 9.8 Dancers in an improvisational movement score in (Perma)Culture (2014). 166 Photo by Eric Breitbart. 9.9 Dancer Maria Bauman with ceramic vessels in (Perma)Culture (2014). 166 Photo by Eric Breitbart. 9.10 Audience members and dancers building together onstage with ceramic vessels in (Perma)Culture (2014). 167 Photo by Alexandra Pfister. 9.11 Hut #6 (2011) by Jill Sigman at the Oslo Opera House; Oslo, Norway. 172 Photo by Elisabeth Færøy Lund. 9.12 Hut #9 (2014) by Jill Sigman at Godsbanen; Aarhus, Denmark. 173 Photo by L2 Lab/Alejandra Ugarte. 9.13 Hut #7 (2012) by Jill Sigman at Arts@Renaissance; Brooklyn, NY. 173 Photo by Rafael Gamo. 9.14 Hut #7 detail (2012) by Jill Sigman. 174 Photo by Rafael Gamo. 9.15 Jill Sigman in a performance of TILL at Hut #7 (2012). 175 Photo by Eric Breitbart. 9.16 Sigman and audience members on the lot in TILL at Hut #7 (2012). 176 Photo by Elisabeth Færøy Lund. 11.1 Caster Semenya competing at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin. 194 AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus, File. 11.2 Caster Semenya appearing on the cover of YOU Magazine, September 10, 2009. 202 Courtesy of YOU Magazine South Africa. 11.3 Phintias Painter. Attic Hydria, The music lesson. 204 Foto Marburg/Art Resource, NY. 11.4 Venere Felice with Eros. 205 © Vanni/Art Resource, NY. OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 06/24/2016, SPi List of Illustrations xi 11.5 Masaccio (Maso di San Giovanni). Expulsion from Paradise. 207 Scala/Art Resource, NY. 11.6 Titian (Tiziano Vecellio). Venus of Urbino. 1538. 208 Alinari/Art Resource, NY. 11.7 Cranach, Lucas the Elder. The Judgment of Paris. Possibly c.1528. 209 © The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Image source: Art Resource, NY. 11.8 Edouard Manet. Olympia. 1863. 210 © RMN-Grand Palais/Art Resource, NY. 11.9 Eugène Delacroix. Death of Sardanapalus (Ashurbanipal 668–627 bce). 1827. 211 © Musée du Louvre, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais/Angèle Dequier/Art Resource, NY. 11.10 Jean-Léon Gérôme. A Roman Slave Market, c.1884. 212 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 05/24/2016, SPi List of Contributors Ann J. Cahill is Professor of Philosophy at Elon University. She has written exten- sively on the philosophy of the body. She is author of Overcoming Objectification: A Carnal Ethics (Routledge, 2010) and Rethinking Rape (Cornell, 2001), as well as art- icles including “In Defense of Self-Defense” (Philosophical Papers, 2011), “Getting to My Fighting Weight” (Hypatia, 2010), “Feminist Pleasure and Feminine Beautification” (Hypatia, 2003), and “Foucault, Rape, and the Construction of the Feminine Body” (Hypatia, 2000). She is the co-editor of a special issue of the Journal of Social Philosophy dedicated to the theme of “Miscarriage, Reproductive Loss, and Fetal Death.” Maria del Guadalupe Davidson is Director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and Co-Director of the Center for Social Justice at the University of Oklahoma. Her research areas include rhetorical theory and criticism, the intersec- tion of race and gender, black feminism, and Africana philosophical thought. Her new book Black Women, Agency, and the New Black Feminism is forthcoming from Routledge. Dr. Davidson’s most recent publications include the co-edited volume Exploring Race in Predominantly White Classrooms: Scholars of Color Reflect (Routledge, 2014). Dr. Davidson is currently working on a book project about black women and curriculum design, and a larger academic and social project that explores the one hundred-year anniversary of women’s suffrage.