Although the human body is undeniably a physical fact, it is equally a "product" of culture. The body is, in fact, a set of symbols, conceived in accordance with the meanings dictated by a certain culture to the community and the individual who belongs to it, whether it is covered by clothes, only decorated with jewelry, tattoos, makeup, etc. or, on the other hand, naked (it also depends on the social context because nudity functions as a hidden referent and has an ambivalent meaning), free, sanctioned or closed (the autonomy of the body is always limited, just as its subjectivization is realized in the social sphere and interaction with others bodies).
Also, the process of its (re)shaping is in accordance with current social values and choices that the "owner" of the body makes (moral, aesthetic, economic, political, ideological, etc.), but also with restrictions and even alienations, since, as M. Foucault notices, as an intercultural and transhistorical phenomenon more at the level of conceptual than physical. Namely, the subject builds his identity on a cognitive, emotional and physical level, while in the absence of that symbiosis, he loses all transcendental and moral legitimacy to manage the meaning of his existence.
The body and physicality are studied in a specific way by almost all scientific disciplines. But unlike the natural sciences, which study the body from a biological, physiological, health, demographic or similar "measurable" aspect, the social sciences and humanities deal, among other things, with the aesthetic, economic, political, and even ideological treatment of the human body (say, its social control and reproduction of power relations, exploitation of physical labor, etc.), as well as the widest interpretation of physicality in the sense of civilization, connecting the past and the present.
Certain philosophical disciplines, as well as religion, are particularly concerned with the relationship between the spirit and the body, that is, the material and spiritual aspects of the body. In the discursive field of physiosophy are precisely the changing spiritual-cultural meanings of the body, ethical norms, the spiritual dimension of the human individual, existentialist practice, the phenomena of closeness, passion and love, etc.
In sociocultural anthropology, first of all, human corporeality is problematized in terms of its conceptualization as a physical given to which the cultural code and its presentation (in an aesthetic, gender, sexual, artistic, virtual, political or other sense) are added, given that the body is constantly in the process of visual, but also of any other meaningful review and modification.
The body, precisely, through the socio-anthropological perspective, was among the first to be posed as a problem by M. Mos, dealing with the so-called body techniques and explaining with them even the most banal human actions and movements, i.e. their social context by introducing the term habitus - a common way of behavior that has both a social and cultural nature, from which it follows that differences in the way the body is used develop during the socialization process. And according to Deliège, the body, as a total social fact, is the basic "instrument" for self-realization that, even through the simplest gestures, makes it possible to find meaning. In such a whole, it is rationally connected with the animal physiological organism, although its forms exist in different physical variants and cultural interpretations.
The issue of (over)power of one body over another, legalized social status, exploitation of the body in a specific social environment was among the first to be problematized by Marxists (Marks i English ) analyzing the effects of the industrial revolution, where they paid special attention to the body (primarily the worker) in the working conditions of that time, that is, to the criticism of the exploitation of labor power understood as "the totality of physical and spiritual abilities that exist in the physical, living personality of man, and which he sets in motion whenever it produces use-values of any kind" (Capital). According to Marx's interpretation, alienation separates the concept of fatigue into the exploitation of man by another man and, in parallel, into forced exhausting physical labor.
Even today, the issue of ethical behavior towards the body is equally relevant, i.e. working conditions, voluntary or forced labor and physical exploitation of the bodies of the working class, even though it is, how M. Ble notes in Preface to the Body Dictionary (2010), somewhat neglected, because such a body in contemporary culture is neither classy nor intellectually inspiring, but usually and only partially owned by the still "Taylorized" exploited man who sells the strength of his body. For Bourdieu is, precisely, the mentioned body "point" where the consciousness of the working class materializes, especially when it comes to an overemphasized and full of power body, which is also one of the last autonomous spaces of the conquered classes and their opportunities to create their own representations of a whole man and the social world, i.e. . to maintain the principle of class identity and unity.
Also, it is impossible to separate the physiological from the spiritual. Therefore, the need for sensual pleasures, nutrition, expression of sexuality, etc. in all cultures standardized mostly on the social level. Thus, the body is also a point of social control, but also of condemnation, punishment and isolation (as well as the defense of the body of each subject, except that it is a question of ethics, subject of jurisprudence and complex legislation). Punishing a person, namely, always goes through his body, starting with bodily isolation (partial denial of freedom of movement or complete isolation from other bodies, i.e. subjects), branding, public desecration, etc.
There is also a wide polemical field regarding the aestheticization of the body. In fact, the right to dispose of one's own body is violated for many reasons, personal or collective, apart from the "most conspicuous" (self)imposed standard of aestheticization. Body hygiene, care for health, feeling of shame, limits of pain are standardized. violence, the degree of freedom or restrictions on the physical movement of the body (prison, slavery) and other forms of social sanctions and pressures on every human body.
Social control over drives, especially over sexuality, is particularly pronounced, so it is transferred from the natural field to the social, even political, field, i.e. through social institutions what is socially acceptable and what is taboo is channeled. According to Foucault, the body is one of the proposed models for thinking about the relationship to oneself and seeing oneself through others, so ethics in sexuality cannot rely only on free will and desire, because the consent of the other is necessary. I M. Godelije in the sphere of relational relations, it interprets all sensory pleasures, starting from food and other physical pleasures to the regulation of human sexuality and biological reproduction, precisely as prerequisites for the formation of social relations.
Because the relationship to the body contains a tension on two levels, between what originates from within us, sensory sensitivity and what is our reason, as well as between our entire bodily being and externally valued behavior, powerful social and sexual definitions are embodied in it. of normality, so it is, according to the theorist of popular culture J. Fisc, a place of discipline and punishment for deviation from those norms. Control of the body was also carried out in all societies through ritual purity with the meaning of order as opposed to impurity, which represents a state of chaos, danger to the individual and the community, which in an anthropological sense was specially processed M. Douglas.
The current individualistic hedonism, which is mostly based on the needs of the body, is a frequent topic and subject of criticism within the contemporary consumerist society and its values. The autonomy of the body in the contemporary, extremely visualized (and medialized) society can be problematized, not only through the controversial field of interpretation of civil liberties and rights, but also through inconsistencies in application), but also through the same mechanisms that strive to re- they take it "under control" by formatting it aesthetically and morally through the standards of popular culture (how the body should look, how it should behave in various social interactions, etc.).
Cultural theorists also see in the so-called the new culture needs a problem in the apparent freedom of choice, because the body, as in previous social and ideological systems, is equally "educated", now according to the current value and aesthetic standards of the consumer society, in order to be a reflection of the given historical moment. Today's cult of the body, in this sense, is constructed around the fulfillment of the hedonistic desires of the individual and almost exclusively on the physical appearance, whose ideals arose from the world of commercial consumption and which they offer, according to U. Eku, patinated shows, film, television, so mass media. Similarly, in modern society, where media and consumerist culture function according to their own, mostly economic, rules, the body increasingly becomes a "goods" for exchange on the market, especially through ubiquitous marketing in which it is beautified, repaired, or "photoshopped" in order to either, even if fake, perfect.
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