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an interpretive framework that recognises, appraises and rewards the
labours of becoming, through which we can all stake a claim on
life itself. Jones makeover culture also serves to throw visibility and
recognition into critical light  an exploration of these makes up the
next part of this book.
Part II
Framing the Self
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3
Living Autopsies: Visualising
Responsibility
In the quest for happiness and peace the first and most
important key is to take personal responsibility for your life.
I believe that we are 100% accountable and responsible for
everything in our lives, even if we don t like it.
Julie Way (2009) Inner Self, http://www.innerself.com.au
Introduction
Stewart s drinking was getting out of hand. He was starting to feel the
impact on his health, but it was his family and partner who d had
enough of him being a  bad drunk and they wanted him to quit,  if
he doesn t do that, then I will have to seriously review the situation of
our relationship, because he is going to lose everything if he doesn t
stop , warned his partner. A wake-up call was needed. Successfully
nominated for the BBC Three makeover show Make My Body Younger,
Stewart finds himself strapped into a bodysuit nervously gripping the
sides of a hospital gurney in a pathology suite. His family watch on
as the show s presenter, George Lamb, invites a pathologist to assess
what damage Stewart s lifestyle has exacted on his  insides . The light
dims; the pathologist steps forward to draw his hand down Stewart s
chest which slices open in response.  So what is happening now is
that the primary incision is occurring, coming down the skin of your
chest , explains the pathologist, who gestures at the incision making
it slowly retract,  pulling the skin back and we see your heart and
lungs , and then  your liver and intestine  all beating away . Stewart
looks down in stunned silence; his family is clearly shocked at the
71
72 Lifestyle Media and the Formation of the Self
verisimilitude of the visual living representation of his inner body
projected on his chest. The living autopsy has started.
The screening of autopsies and representations of internal organs
is not new. TV s Silent Witness, The Expert, the CSI franchise,
and projects blurring art and science like Gunther von Hagen s
Köperwelten and The Visible Human Project, all indicate a robust
interest in  insides . What is new is the increasing popularity of the
 insides in lifestyle media. Not only does the  inner self circulate in
self-help books, but flick through TV channels: there are adverts invit-
ing us to visualise and then assess the age of our heart (What s your
heart-age? asks Flora Pro-Activ), to score our blood cholesterol (Benecol
ads), and to imagine a disgruntled gut ( Give yourself some tummy
loving care with Activitia ). Pick up a glossy magazine: skin care
cosmetics and anti-wrinkle developments like Botox are mining the
surface of the skin to exploit new territories of cellular vitality, mus-
culature and structure. And there s more to come; industry giants,
L Oreal, Shiseido and Kose are pumping funds into the research
and development of nanotechnology to work on appearances from
beneath. All in all, something is happening to surfaces. Not only is the
 inner enjoying heightened visibility but it s taking on a very active
relationship to the external:  when you re feeling good on the inside
it shows on the outside is the gleeful message of Danone Activia.
Pro-Biotic Yogurt and Danone are not alone in fostering a healthy
relationship between  insides and  outsides .
The living autopsy could be explained as a shock tactic, or nar-
rative gimmick to create a distinctive selling point for the show,
and  insides may, more generally, offer a logical site for a marketing
industry seeking out new niches and angles. Yet, this chapter argues
that the recent visibility of  insides recasts them as the guardian
of the self; organs, blood cells, digestive tracts and the inner self
become surfaces for surveillance, risk-projection and sites for better-
ment. These surfaces emerge through a whole host of technological
and professional developments allowing insides to be seen and more
sharply imagined (from X-rays, ultrasound, CGI to psychotherapy).
This chapter focuses on the ways  insides emerge through discourses
of health. By discussing health I am not suggesting that one shouldn t
care for one s health, what interests this chapter is how the injunc-
tion that we ought to drags the inners into a moral project of being
and becoming. Principally, this chapter is concerned with how a
Living Autopsies 73
particular visualising of the insides draws them into a project of
citizenship-making through processes of responsibilisation. By draw-
ing on Judith Butler s (2009) discussions on the mediation of visual
imagery, this chapter argues that specific  framings of insides help
to demark, and reproduce socially approved and socially disapproved
lives in terms of their perceived ability to enact responsibility. This
chapter extends this line of argument to claim that responsibilisation
also creates surfaces and opportunities for rehabilitation  that is
to say, the restoration of a disapproved life to a socially approved
one. The operations and consequences of rehabilitation are charted
throughout this part of the book to argue that the opportunity of
rehabilitation is a necessary aspect of neo-liberal governance.
Back to Stewart
After the primary incision, the pathologist sifts through Stewart s
body, assessing each organ in turn to track the cancers and dis-
eases caused by poor lifestyle choices. To underscore a message of
lifestyle-induced damage each organ is given a biological age based
on its condition which when calculated produces Stewart s internal
biological age. As with all cases on Make My Body Younger, a life of
nutritional neglect and excess tots up to a shocking gap between the
biological age of the inner body and the chronological age of the
participant. Twenty-five-year-old Stewart has the internal organs of a
forty-year old, the brain function of a pensioner and low sperm motil-
ity. Shocked into saving his own life Stewart, with the help of medical
experts, turns things around. It s a hard and emotional struggle but
new batches of medical tests some weeks later reveal a new  brain age
of 18 years and a viable sperm count. Stewart is pleased that his  hard [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]