Communications

The body as an object of desire…for the media

Today’s  “reality” shows, like Extreme Makeover (ABC) or The Swan (Fox), show people “remaking” themselves in terms of physical appearance, breast implants are offered as door prizes in bars, and more and more people are getting Botox injections to erase wrinkles. Why has esthetic surgery become so popular? Élisabeth Mercier, a Master’s student in the Department of Communications, is exploring the issue.  

Mercier’s thesis, “ Les mises en marché et en discours de la chirurgie esthétique” (The marketing and discourse of esthetic surgery), discusses surgery as a cultural product, with the associated values, such as self-esteem, love, beauty, and wealth, all of which are propagated by the media. It’s worth noting that esthetic surgery, unlike other medical specialties, relies to a huge extent on advertising via Web sites, TV, and radio, and therefore the need for public discourse and marketing – which is precisely what interests Mercier.

Mercier began by exploring the context, pinpointing factors that led to the way esthetic surgery is practiced and understood today: the emergence of plastic surgery as a medical discipline to remodel the faces of disfigured soldiers returning from World War I, the advent of the consumer society, the sexual revolution of the 1960s, the development of new  technologies and contemporary psychology. “We gradually began to make discursive associations between physical appearance and self-esteem and began to treat the ‘soul wounds’ caused by physical flaws,” Mercier explains.

Her thesis, based on  Extreme Makeover and other shows, explores the way esthetic surgery enters the public discourse and the marketplace. We are seeing a “medicalization of physical appearance,” supported by scientific studies on esthetic surgery and based on the supposedly ideal proportions of the body. From there, it’s not a great leap to suggest surgery as a cure that “treats” the body and, at the same time, psychological health. “When conditioned behaviours such as the use of esthetic surgery become inevitable, or even natural, in this way, we are at the point of conforming with these new standards without even realizing what we’re doing,” says Mercier.

The body, and everything to do with it, has become the ultimate retrenchment of power. “In a consumer society, to compel people to consume more, you have to create a permanent state of dissatisfaction and an emotional vulnerability they will seek to fill through practices that come to seem normal. Today, in addition to permeating our marital and sexual intimacy, these practices are assaulting our physical integrity.”  Obviously, Mercier’s research is eminently theoretical. Her primary goal is to shed light on a highly topical phenomenon that is all around us and to which we don’t give much thought, perhaps because we’re too close to it. The researcher also hopes to move beyond the debate on whether esthetic surgery is liberating or oppressive, making it part and parcel of an interdisciplinary reflection that would draw upon, for example, psychology and sociology.

Her research is supervised by Line Grenier, an associate professor in the Department of Communications and Co-Director of the Laboratory on Popular Culture, Knowledge, and Criticism. Although academics often look down their noses at popular culture, Mercier feels it has some valuable lessons for our society. “What especially interests me,” she says, “is observing how, in our everyday lives, we obey certain laws without even being aware of what we’re doing.” And that’s the case for esthetic surgery, a phenomenon she feels has yet to be explored in sufficient depth.