Bodies in Circulation: Power, Difference, and the Foucauldian Configuration of Corporeality

Social media and digital platforms are giving rise to new forms of body representation such as selfies and avatars. At the same time, body positivity and -neutrality movements are striving. This paper argues that these new body constructions emerge along social categories of difference and within power relations. Within such relations, often understood as intersectionally interacting categories of difference, individuals have a wide range of bodily experiences. These experiences remain largely under-explored in political theory, although other fields like psychology, sociology and biology are already concerned of body experiences. At the same time, struggles over categories of difference, which open up along specific moments of discrimination and privilege, are linked to a genuine critique of power and the political. Addressing this contradiction requires a deeper understanding of the dynamics of difference and power around bodies. This paper expands on Foucault's ideas on experiential dynamics and reality construction and reconceptualizes bodies as (shared) experiences. This approach not only allows for a critical examination of how bodies are constituted, experienced and transformed in different contexts, but promotes an transdisciplinary dialogue on bodies. In doing so, it makes an contribution to the co-creation of reality between activism and scholarship.