Corporeality

From Geography

Corporeality is a concept connected to the German sociologist Niklas Luhmann. It refers to the human body which is a physical carrier for psychic and social systems. Apart from the psychic and social systems, machines and organisms are also systems. These systems are not distinguished from the environment. Human beings are crucial actors in communication. So human bodies are a part of the environment of systems of society. The body can be seen as the context for operations. Thoughts are conceived in the mind, which is only present because the body facilitates it. For thoughts to leave the mind and be conveyed to other minds one has to speak, which is a bodily action. Therefore the body is the context for operations and facilitates the mind and with that it facilitates communication. Society sprouts from communication and consists only of communication. Thus corporeality is necessary for communication, because it provides a context for communication. However, Luhmann does not elaborate this concept in systems theory. He only recognizes that corporeality in communication exists (Gren & Zierhofer, 2002).

References

Gren, M. & Zierhofer, W. (2002). The Unity of difference. A critical appraisal of Niklas Luhmann´s theory of social systems in the context of corporeality and spatiality. Nijmegen: University of Nijmegen.

Created by User:BoudewijnIdema, 17 October 2011, 20:28 (UTC)

Edited by Bert Hegger on September 25th 2012.