(The) Gaze
One finds that the notion of the gaze (or just gaze) is used in different ways. (This is, perhaps not surprising since it is a notion closely associated with postmodernism.) Generally-speaking, one might say that it is concerned with how an audience perceives the presentation of others. In feminist thought the gaze deals with such issues as how men view women (including the objectification of women), how women view themselves, how women view other women etc. In terms of the notion of BodyWatching presented on this website, the audience that does the gazing is an audience of one: myself. I am concerned with what can be seen when I apply critical thought to biological bodies.
In a real sense, what I am looking at I am objectifying. I am not concerned with the persons (where persons exist) associated with the bodies considered. I am seeing bodies as biological entities which impinge upon the world and upon each other by virtue of simply being in the world.
The French philosopher Michel Foucault (1926-1984) coined the term medical gaze to refer to the way in which medical professionals often separate the body of a patient from the person of the patient. This was often part of a dehumanizing power relationship that works to the detriment of the patient. An important tool used in this process is biological reductionism where what the patient experiences is broken down into constituent physical causes.
In objectifying bodies, I hope not to succumb to biological reductionism - at least not in the same way. The point of dissecting bodies is to understand what makes them bodies at the organismal (whole) level. Biological reductionism is a characteristic of many textbooks used in biological and health science. In textbooks of anatomy and physiology, for example, having described the component structures and processes of the body, there is never a section that brings what has been deconstructed back together again; textbooks of anatomy and physiology are always about dissection and reduction and never about understanding that the whole may be greater than the sum of its parts.
Le regard
The gaze is a translation of the original French term le regard. In English, to gaze can have the connotation of staring idly into space as when one gazes at beautiful scenery or so idly as to be daydreaming. Le regard is reminiscent of the English word 'regard' which implies a more active engagement with the object of one's attentions and is devoid of any connotations of idleness.
Different Gazes
The gaze is frequently characterised by who is doing the gazing but can sometimes be found characterised by the direction of the gaze and by what is being gazed upon. The following are examples (not an exhaustive list) of different gazes that have some relevance here:
The spectator's gaze
This is very much the type of gaze adopted here. It is the gaze of an observer viewing a certain object of interest. On this website, I am the spectator.
Intra-diegetic gaze
Intra-diegetic gaze occurs where one person depicted in a text looks at another person (or object) depicted in the same text. If we are all subjects in the story of life, then the way in which we view each other is an intra-diegetic gaze. When I look at bodies for the purposes of this website, there will be elements of a spectator's gaze, but since I am looking at things which often includes me, there will be an element of intra-diegetic gaze involved as well. Biologists typically exclude themselves from the study of the objects of biology even when they are one of those objects. This is, to some extent, understandable on the grounds of objectivity. However, one might question whether an objective picture is an entirely complete one. (In a way complimentary to the intra-diegetic gaze, is the extra-diegetic gaze which occurs where a person depicted in a text looks out from that text and addresses the reader or audience.)
Other named types of gaze have been described, but these need not be considered here.
There is a psychological aspect to the relationship between the gazer and the object gazed-upon. Gazing is not the same as the mere act of looking. The gazer may be described as being in a privileged position in that they, by initiating the gaze, have not only established but execute the relationship with those gazed-upon. The gazer is the free agent; the gazed-upon is in an ethically vulnerable position. Sometimes, although arguably not always, the gazer may take an attitude of superiority with regard the object of the gaze. There can be no place for a relationship associated with power or values here. If one is gazing at a set that (in some respects) includes oneself, one cannot, as gazer, be superior to the object of the gaze since one cannot be superior to oneself at the same time as being inferior to oneself!
Note
1 - Although I have used the term elsewhere (for an example click here), I still do not find the idea of 'biological meaning' an easy one to explain simply. Put succinctly, given that biological entities exist in the world then not only does the world have a bearing on those entities, they have a bearing on every thing else in the world. Furthermore, the biological nature of these entities determines the form that that bearing can and cannot be. Thus, biological entities, by virtue of being in the world 'mean' something to the world. For 'mean', in the previous sentence, one can substitute words like 'do', 'signify', 'offer' etc. I use the word 'mean' instead because it suggests something fuller than just 'doing', 'signifying', 'offering' etc.