scholarly journals Transnational Body Projects: Media Representations of Cosmetic Surgery Tourism in Argentina and the United States

2013 ◽  
pp. 57-81 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erynn Masi De Casanova ◽  
Barbara Sutton
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cosmetic Surgery ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Medical Tourism ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
The Media ◽  
Professional Resources ◽  
Transnational Body

Cosmetic surgery tourism (CST) is part of the growing trend known as medical tourism. As people in the global North travel to less affluent countries to modify their bodies through cosmetic surgery, their transnational body projects are influenced by both economic "materialities" and traveling cultural "imaginaries." This article presents a content analysis of media representations of cosmetic surgery tourism in a major country sending patient-tourists (the United States) and a popular receiving country (Argentina). The power relations of globalization appear to be played out in the media. U.S. sources assert U.S. hegemony through a discourse emphasizing the risks of CST in the global South, in contrast with medical excellence in the U.S. Argentine sources portray Argentina as a country struggling to gain a foothold in the global economy, but staking a claim on modernity through cultural and professional resources. The analyzed articles also offer a glimpse of how patient-tourists fuel sectors of the global economy by placing their bodies at the forefront, seeking to merge medical procedures and touristic pleasures. There is a gender dimension to these portrayals, as women are especially likely to engage in CST. Their transnational body projects are tainted by negative media portrayals, which represent them as ignorant, uninformed, and driven mainly by the low price of surgery overseas. Our comparative approach sheds light on converging and diverging perspectives on both ends of the cosmetic surgery tourism chain, showing that patterns in CST portrayals differ according to the position of a country in the world-system.

Medical Tourism Patient Mortality

2022 ◽  
pp. 143-162
Author(s):  
Alicia Mason ◽  
Sakshi Bhati ◽  
Ran Jiang ◽  
Elizabeth A. Spencer
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Cosmetic Surgery ◽  
Medical Tourism ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Patient Death ◽  
Bereavement Counseling ◽  
Media Reports ◽  
Social Support Systems

Medical tourism is a process in which a consumer travels from one's place of residence and receives medical treatment, thus becoming a patient. Patients Beyond Borders (PBB) forecasts some 1.9 million Americans will travel outside the United States for medical care in 2019. This chapter explores media representations of patient mortality associated with medical tourism within the global news media occurring between 2009-2019. A qualitative content analysis of 50 patient mortality cases found that (1) a majority of media representations of medical tourism patient death are of middle-class, minority females between 25-55 years of age who seek cosmetic surgery internationally; (2) sudden death, grief, and bereavement counseling is noticeably absent from medical tourism providers (MTPs); and (3) risk information from authority figures within the media reports is often vague and abstract. A detailed list of health communication recommendations and considerations for future medical tourists and their social support systems are provided.

scholarly journals Anytime? Anywhere?: Reframing Debates Around Community and Municipal Wireless Networking

2008 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Forlano
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Wireless Networks ◽  
The United States ◽  
Wireless Networking ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
The Past ◽  
Local Characteristics ◽  
The Media ◽  
Technological Affordances ◽  
The Way

Over the past three years, cities across the United States have announced ambitious plans to build community and municipal wireless networks.  The phrase ‘anytime, anywhere’ has had a powerful impact in shaping the way in which debates about these networks have been framed.  However, ‘anytime, anywhere’, which alludes to convenience, freedom and ubiquity, is of little use in describing the realities of municipal wireless networks, and, more importantly, it ignores the particular local characteristics of communities and the specific practices of users.  This paper examines the media representations and technological affordances of wireless networks as well as incorporating the practices of those that build and use them in an attempt to reframe these debates.

Manicures as Transnational Body Labor

2019 ◽  
pp. 184-208
Author(s):  
Miliann Kang
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Nail Salon ◽  
Transnational Body

Based on interviews and participant observations with nail salon owners, workers, customers, and advocates, in addition to analysis of media representations, this chapter expands the concept of “body labor” to explore the dynamics of emerging circuits of “transnational body labor” that connect Asian workers to immigrant niches in the United States, and increasingly forge material and aesthetic ties back to Asia.

Medical Tourism Patient Mortality

2020 ◽  
pp. 206-225
Author(s):  
Alicia Mason ◽  
Sakshi Bhati ◽  
Ran Jiang ◽  
Elizabeth A. Spencer
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Cosmetic Surgery ◽  
Medical Tourism ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Patient Death ◽  
Bereavement Counseling ◽  
Media Reports ◽  
Social Support Systems

Medical tourism is a process in which a consumer travels from one's place of residence and receives medical treatment, thus becoming a patient. Patients Beyond Borders (PBB) forecasts some 1.9 million Americans will travel outside the United States for medical care in 2019. This chapter explores media representations of patient mortality associated with medical tourism within the global news media occurring between 2009-2019. A qualitative content analysis of 50 patient mortality cases found that (1) a majority of media representations of medical tourism patient death are of middle-class, minority females between 25-55 years of age who seek cosmetic surgery internationally; (2) sudden death, grief, and bereavement counseling is noticeably absent from medical tourism providers (MTPs); and (3) risk information from authority figures within the media reports is often vague and abstract. A detailed list of health communication recommendations and considerations for future medical tourists and their social support systems are provided.

Fighting for “Respectability”

2011 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
pp. 350-376 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Rhodes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
United Kingdom ◽  
Working Class ◽  
White Male ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
The Public ◽  
Gendered Identities ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Media

In the United States and the United Kingdom, the White male boxer has long held a special appeal among the public and media. Boxing “heroes” are constructed not only on the basis of Whiteness but also on the basis of their perceived “working-class” nature, at a time when “working-class” or “blue-collar” identities in both the United Kingdom and the United States are subjected to forms of negative stigmatization. However, central to the appeal of the White, “working-class” boxing hero is their asserted “respectability,” which is used to establish distance from less “respectable” forms of raced, classed, and gendered identities. The media representations that surround boxing champions Ricky Hatton and Kelly Pavlik illustrate the way in which their “respectability” is asserted, explored, and related to broader conversations about a perceived growing “White underclass.”

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Jasmine Mitchell
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Black Women ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Cultural Productions ◽  
Racial Ideologies ◽  
Sexual Regulation ◽  
Racial Democracy ◽  
Time Period ◽  
The Media

The introduction describes the book's main arguments of how media representations of mixed-black women manage blackness— through its erasure, its sexual regulation, and by presenting an acceptable blackness with a goal to whiten the population. Stepping into contemporary debates surrounding a postracial United States and Brazilian racial democracy, the book illustrates overlapping racial ideologies that are only visible when Brazilian and U.S. cultural productions are read alongside one another. The introduction lays out the hemispheric framework, explains why and how the book uses the terms mulatta in the United States and mulata in Brazil, and defines concepts of racial management and racial intimacies. Finally, the introduction justifies the media archive and the time period of the 2000s.

Recent Police Killings in the United States: A Three-City Comparison

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 196-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela S. Lee ◽  
Ronald Weitzer ◽  
Daniel E. Martínez
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
News Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
Police Misconduct ◽  
Specific Content ◽  
High Profile ◽  
The Media

Recent police killings of citizens in the United States have attracted massive coverage in the media, large-scale public protests, and demands for reform of police departments throughout the country. This study is based on a content analysis of newspaper coverage of recent high-profile incidents that resulted in a citizen’s death in Ferguson, North Charleston, and Baltimore. We identify both incident-specific content as well as more general patterns that transcend the three cases. News media coverage of similar incidents in past decades tended to be episodic and favored the police perspective. Our findings point to some important departures from this paradigm. Reporting in our three cases was more likely to draw connections between discrete incidents, to attach blame to the police, and to raise questions about the systemic causes of police misconduct. These findings may be corroborated in future studies of news media representations of high-profile policing incidents elsewhere.

Ocena antykryzysowej polityki gospodarczej Stanów Zjednoczonych i wybranych państw członkowskich Unii Europejskiej w latach 2005–2014

2016 ◽  
pp. 26-46
Author(s):  
Marcin Jan Flotyński
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
European Union ◽  
Financial Markets ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
The United States ◽  
The European Union ◽  
High Volatility ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Domestic Products

The global financial crisis in 2007–2009 began a period of high volatility on the financial markets. Specifically, it caused an increased amplitude of fluctuations of the level of gross domestic products, the level of investment and consumption and exchange rates in particular countries. To address the adverse market circumstances, governments and central banks took actions in order to bolster the weakening global economy. The aim of this article is to present the anti-crisis actions in the United States and selected member states of the European Union, including Poland, and an assessment of their efficiency. The analysis conducted indicates that generally the actions taken in the United States in response to the crisis were faster and more adequate to the existing circumstances than in the European Union.

Liberating Afghan Women

2004 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 70-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nancy Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Organizations ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Afghan Women ◽  
The Media ◽  
Policy Priority

Public opinion in the United States and elsewhere celebrated the liberation of Afghan women following the defeat of the Taliban government. The United States promised to stay in Afghanistan and foster security, economic development, and human rights for all, especially women. After years of funding various anti- Soviet Mujahidin warlords, the United States had agreed to help reconstruct the country once before in 1992, when the Soviet-backed government fell, but had lost interest when the warlords began to fight among themselves. This time, however, it was going to be different. To date, however, conditions have not improved for most Afghan women and reconstruction has barely begun. How did this happen? This article explores media presentations of Afghan women and then compares them with recent reports from human rights organizations and other eyewitness accounts. It argues that the media depictions were built on earlier conceptions of Muslim societies and allowed us to adopt a romantic view that disguised or covered up the more complex historical context of Afghan history and American involvement in it. We allowed ourselves to believe that Afghans were exotic characters who were modernizing or progressing toward a western way of life, despite the temporary setback imposed by the Taliban government. In Afghanistan, however, there was a new trope: the feminist Afghan woman activist. Images of prominent Afghan women sans burqa were much favored by the mass media and American policymakers. The result, however, was not a new focus on funding feminist political organizations or making women’s rights a foreign policy priority; rather, it was an unwillingness to fulfill obligations incurred during decades of American-funded mujahidin warfare, to face the existence of deteriorating conditions for women, resumed opium cultivation, and a resurgent Taliban, or to commit to a multilateral approach that would bring in the funds and expertise needed to sustain a long-term process of reconstruction.

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