1st Edition

Cosmetic Surgery A Feminist Primer

Edited By Meredith Jones, Cressida J. Heyes Copyright 2009
    276 Pages
    by Routledge

    276 Pages
    by Routledge

    Practices of cosmetic surgery have grown exponentially in recent years in both over-developed and developing worlds. What comprises cosmetic surgery has also changed, with a plethora of new procedures and an extraordinary rise of non-surgical operations. As the practices of cosmetic surgery have multiplied and diversified, so have feminist approaches to understanding them. For the first time leading feminist scholars including Susan Bordo, Kathy Davis, Vivian Sobchack and Kathryn Pauly Morgan, have been brought together in this comprehensive volume to reveal the complexity of feminist engagements with the phenomenon that still remains vastly more popular among women. Offering a diversity of theoretical, methodological and political approaches Cosmetic Surgery: A Feminist Primer presents not only the latest, cutting-edge research in this field but a challenging and unique approach to the issue that will be of key interest to researchers across the social sciences and humanities.

    Biography

    Cressida J. Heyes is Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Gender and Sexuality and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Alberta, Canada. Meredith Jones is a Lecturer at the Institute for Interactive Media at the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia.

    'This is an important and timely collection of essays, presenting recent and complex investigations in Cosmetic Surgery Studies, whilst also revisiting landmark feminist interventions in a manner that gives key authors the opportunity to update their thinking in light of these more recent debates.' Ruth Holliday, University of Leeds, UK 'Editors Heyes and Jones have put together a collection of essays that is invaluable for anyone interested in the subject. It examines cosmetic surgery in relation to neoliberal discourse, national identity in an increasingly globalised industry, the makeover television genre, and what Nikki Sullivan has elsewhere called "white optics". The collection also examines carefully the ways that cosmetic surgery straddles the border between traditional medicine and elective procedures, and the moral and ethical questions that arise as a result. It is a pertinent collection given the popularity and presence of cosmetic surgery in Western global media and popular culture.' Times Higher Education ’The benefits of this collection are numerous. Heyes and Jones compiled a feminist primer that presents the multiple facets of feminist cosmetic surgery criticism. They selected articles that cover the development of this field, discuss methodological issues, open up new perspectives, and, most importantly, present them in dialogue with each other.’ Sextures