Sites Of Autopsy In Contemporary Culture (S U N Y Series in Postmodern Culture)

In this compelling interdisciplinary study, Elizabeth Klaver considers how autopsies are performed in a variety of contexts, from the'real'thing in hospitals and county morgues to various depictions in paintings, novels, plays, films, and television shows. Autopsies can serve a variety of pedagogical, legal, scientific, and social functions, and the autopsied cadaver, Klaver shows, has lately become one of the most spectacular bodies offered up to the public on film, television, and the Internet. Setting her discussion within the history of the modern autopsy, and including the narrative of her own attendance at a medical autopsy, Klaver makes the autopsy readable in a number of diverse venues, from Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lesson and Vesalius's Fabrica to The Silence of the Lambs, The X-Files, and CSI. Moving from the actual autopsy itself to its broader symbolic ramifications, Klaver addresses questions as disparate as the social constructedness of the body, the perception and treatment of death under late capitalism, and the ubiquity of paranoia in contemporary culture. "In this interdisciplinary study, Elizabeth Klaver considers how autopsies are performed in a variety of contexts, from the "real" thing in hospitals and county morgues to various depictions in paintings, novels, plays, films, and television shows. Autopsies can serve a variety of pedagogical, legal, scientific, and social functions, and the autopsied cadaver, Klaver shows, has lately become one of the most spectacular bodies offered up to the public on film, television, and the Internet. Setting her discussion within the history of the modern autopsy, and including the narrative of her own attendance at a medical autopsy, Klaver makes the autopsy readable in a number of diverse venues, from Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lecture and Vesalius's Fabrica to The Silence of the Lambs, The X-Files, and CSI. Moving from the actual autopsy itself to its broader symbolic ramifications, Klaver addresses questions as disparate as the social constructedness of the body, the perception and treatment of death under late capitalism, and the ubiquity of paranoia in contemporary culture."--Jacket Sites ofAutopsy in Contemporary Culture......Page 4 Contents......Page 8 Illustrations......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 12 Introduction......Page 14 1. Autopsy: A Context......Page 22 2. Performance, Autopsy, and the Performative......Page 50 3. Autopsy and the Subject; or, What the Dead Saw......Page 84 4. Autopsy and the Social: The Case of John F. Kennedy......Page 116 5. Autopsy and the Popular......Page 142 Afterword......Page 168 Works Cited......Page 174 A......Page 182 C......Page 184 D......Page 185 G......Page 186 I......Page 187 M......Page 188 O......Page 189 R......Page 190 S......Page 191 V......Page 192 Z......Page 193 In Medicolegal Investigation of Death, Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General, laments the fact that an autopsy was not performed on old King Hamlet. Explores the role and function of the autopsy in Western culture, from Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lecture to The X-Files and CSI. Elizabeth Klaver. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 161-168) And Index.