Rethinking The Body in Pain. Issue 4 (December 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: McIntyre, Michael
• Is Part Of: Subjectivity. Volume 9:Issue 4(2016)
• Page Start: 381
• Page End: 398
• Publication Date: 2016-12
• Subjects: Scarry -- pain -- torture -- sadomasochism -- Bataille -- Nietzsche; Subjectivity -- Periodicals; Critical psychology -- Periodicals; 126
• DOI: 10.1057/s41286-016-0010-x
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1755-6341

Abstract

Abstract This article calls into question two core suppositions of "The Body in Pain": that pain is sheerly aversive; and that those who inflict pain do so unawares. I argue that these pieties avoid disturbing questions regarding the pain-filled body. The controlled experience of pain is central to any number of practices; many of them place the body in extremis. Conversely, there are practices of pain-infliction undertaken with the expectation of gratification or social validation. Pain, in short, is alluring as well as aversive.