Controlling the body: The nature of the cultural spectacle

Feminist theorists have criticized Rene Descartes' conception of oppositional dualism, finding that it falsely separates mind from body and invidiously values mind over body. This ideology generally associates marginalized groups with the body and devalues physicality as seen in the human body and the natural world. Many institutions such as the zoo, the strip club and the historic display of Non-Westerners reflect Cartesian patterns of human isolation from the physical body, from the natural world and from one another. Each of these institutions produces a cultural spectacle in which a member of a marginalized group is marked as the denigrated body. Through objectifying displays, the spectacle reinforces the dominant ideologies, fantasies and fears of a culture. Although physicality has been used to reproduce patterns of domination, it may also be examined as a potential site of resistance.