Varieties of bodily experience Introduction Mary Douglas (Natural Symbols, 1970) described the human body as a microcosm of society. This is not a new idea, the word "microcosm" being derived from the Ancient Greek mikro-kosmos meaning "little world", a term first used by Plato (Schweitzer, Anchor Bible Dictionary, 1992). Plato wrote of the body as a mikro-kosmos, its substance representing the form of the makro-kosmos, or "big world", or the universe. Douglas, however, writes that "the physical …
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showed last 75 words of 1334 total
…I believe that Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ reveals a great deal about the relationship between body experience and violence. Conclusion What, then, do bodies in Britain today reveal about our society? I believe they reveal a society in huge tension. Though superficially British society appears informal and egalitarian it still exerts upon individuals a huge amount of pressure to perform and to conform. This is a pressure still largely experience by women.