http://worldcat.org/entity/work/id/837012295

The desirable body : cultural fetishism and the erotics of consumption

From the mid-nineteenth century onwards the construction and representation of the body has been deeply implicated in the development of capitalist economies. Stratton reveals how the ideologies of state power and gender politics become literally embodied, through an analysis of literature, art and film. Using the accounts of commodity and sexual fetishism outlined by Marx and Freud, Stratton traces the complex relationship between desire and consumption. Man-made female bodies, from the animated doll in E.T.A. Hoffman's famous story, The Sandman, to the 1974 horror movie, The Stepford Wives, have exerted a strong hold over the modern imagination, oscillating between disgust and desire. As well as the changing image of the beautiful female body, Stratton looks at the more recent commodification of male bodies as presented in fashion magazines and by film stars such as Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

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