TY - JOUR
T1 - Toward an Anthropology of Immunology
T2 - The Body as Nation State
AU - Martin, Emily
PY - 1990/12
Y1 - 1990/12
N2 - In this article I describe the main imagery currently used in popular and scientific descriptions of the immune system in the United States: the body as nation state at war over its external borders, containing internal surveillance systems to monitor foreign intruders. Although in some respects this is a boundary‐oriented, internally flat system, in other respects it contains suppressed hierarchies that draw on cultural concepts of race and gender. I suggest what kinds of ideological work such imagery may be doing and what uses people make of it. Other models of the body and immune responses that build on different imagery are described. 1990 American Anthropological Association
AB - In this article I describe the main imagery currently used in popular and scientific descriptions of the immune system in the United States: the body as nation state at war over its external borders, containing internal surveillance systems to monitor foreign intruders. Although in some respects this is a boundary‐oriented, internally flat system, in other respects it contains suppressed hierarchies that draw on cultural concepts of race and gender. I suggest what kinds of ideological work such imagery may be doing and what uses people make of it. Other models of the body and immune responses that build on different imagery are described. 1990 American Anthropological Association
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U2 - 10.1525/maq.1990.4.4.02a00030
DO - 10.1525/maq.1990.4.4.02a00030
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84995893554
SN - 0745-5194
VL - 4
SP - 410
EP - 426
JO - Medical Anthropology Quarterly
JF - Medical Anthropology Quarterly
IS - 4
ER -