This course explores how bodies enable us to examine cultural dynamics, socio-political structures and economic constraints, of which they are the instruments, vectors, witnesses and bearers, but also those which, through them, create new individual and collective horizons in 21st-century societies. Critically exploring how bodies are shaped by history, identity and/or national issues, and processes of classification and hierarchisation, the memory of which they bear, requires complex scientific approaches that need theoretical foundations and a decentred positioning at the heart of this module. It also involves guiding students to think about how these bodies can support new ways of inhabiting a desirable future, a central challenge for our contemporary societies, which are subject to numerous uncertainties. More fundamentally, it is a question of guiding students towards a new sensitivity to what bodies teach us about the worlds we live in, here and elsewhere, their traditions, their strengths and weaknesses: in short, the aim is to guide students to think critically about bodies as cultural and biopolitical spaces and instruments.

Program / Weekly structure (2 days a week)

The first week is devoted to laying the theoretical foundations for a scientific approach to bodies as instruments and witnesses of society. They will also be explored during later discussions with dedicated focus groups. The concepts of multiple bodies, identity, racialisation and subjectivity will be discussed through case studies from fieldwork conducted in Europe, Africa and Brazil. Students will be offered an initial sensitive approach through participant observation in situ, to encourage them to think, based on their own experience, about how bodies ‘speak’.

The second week will explore the links between biological and social bodies through the lens of global health inequalities. Beyond the impact of living conditions and environments on our bodies and lives, we will examine the concepts of discrimination, inequality, vulnerability and embodied violence in order to question the multiple traces and memories that permeate global health relations and are deployed by bodies. The HIV and Covid pandemics will serve as a basis for reflection.

The third week will address the issue of interventions on the body, including female genital mutilation. In addition to the concepts of identity, domination and categorisation associated with these bodies subjected to various acts (cutting, ‘repair’ surgery), we will explore the concepts of embodiment and subjectivation.

The fourth week will focus on the issue of returning human remains held in European public collections to their countries. Based on ongoing debates, we'll talk about the status and challenges of these human remains, which are elements of knowledge, heritage, and collections, to highlight the ethical and moral dynamics that shape North-South relations in the era of decolonisation.

Lessons takes the form of a seminar focused on guided discussion. Students are facilitated in reflecting on their own experiences. They will conduct small-scale observations, and analyze visual materials through the lens of the weekly topic.

Evaluation Methods

1. Thematic presentation given orally in seminar (approx. 3,000 words): analysis of a contemporary vulnerability based on the body, drawing on two authors from the course (30%)
2. Creative project: podcast or visual essay: Students will expand and deepen their seminar-based work by further developing the empirical observations and its restitution in an alternative form (40%)
3. Reflective journal (approx. 1,500 words) based on one's bodily experience in Venice (30%)

Virtual Component
An elearning platform on Moodle will be available in advance, in order to share resources, readings and films. A pre-recorded one-hour course will set the framework for reflection and work.

Three virtual sessions (60 minutes each) will follow:

1. students will be invited to introduce themselves and describe their background),
2. discussion of topics, texts, and assessment methods),
3. choice of seminar topic and alternative form of presentation.

Learning Outcomes
-Acquisition of theoretical skills on ways of problematising the body in anthropology
-Development of a nuanced understanding of the links between biological and social lives
-Familiarisation with debates on social inequalities in health, sexual mutilation, and the return of human remains, from a decolonial perspective
- Restitution of a discourse through a participatory approach.

Readings
- Andro, A., E., Lesclingand, M. (2014), «Long-term consequences of female genital
mutilation in a European context: Self perceived health of FGM women compared to non-FGM women», Social Science and Medicine, 106: 177–184.
-Barr, D. (2019). Health disparities in the United States: Social class, race, ethnicity, and the social determinants of health. (Third ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press.
-Butler Judith. 1993, Bodies That Matter, Routledge New York & London.
-Crenshaw K. (1991). Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color Stanford Law Review, Vol. 43 (6) : 1241-1299 URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1229039
-Farmer, P. (2003). Pathologies of Power. Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor. Berkeley-Los Angeles-London, University of California Press.
-Savoy B. (2022) Africa’s Struggle for Its Art : History of a Postcolonial Defeat. Princeton, Princeton University Press.

Last updated: march 16, 2026