Metaphors of a Healthy Body and Gender Constructs: The Discourse of Healthcare Practitioners at Government and Private Institutions in Santiago de Chile

https://doi.org/10.25058/20112742.n56.03

Lorena Etcheberry Rojas
Universidad de Santiago de Chile

Abstract:

This article explores how healthcare professionals in Santiago, Chile construct metaphors around the “healthy body” based on gender and institutional differences. The qualitative and exploratory research is based on the analysis of 15 semi-structured interviews and is part of a broader investigation. Body metaphors express tensions between biomedical, aesthetic, emotional, and existential views, reflecting a dispute between the technical and the symbolic, between the productive-material and the symbolic. The healthy body emerges as a space of dispute between autonomy, fragility, energy, and control, shaped by biography, gender, and type of institution. The conclusions point to the need to overcome modern dualisms through a comprehensive, sensitive, and situated understanding of the body.

Keywords: healthy body, body metaphors, gender and health.