The subservience of the body to capitalism: quality of life through class interests

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to relate the body to the representations of power between different social classes in the capitalist system, using symbolic interactionism as a tool to allow a broader reflection of the variables under study. The need is perceived to strengthen the body to make it useful to the inherent needs and interests of the ruling class, like a machine, to serve capital and the motherland. The hegemony of the positivist philosophical current has been problematized as a producer of truth and social paradigms that seek to mitigate possible class struggles and favor the establishment of a new social order after the industrial revolution with the emergence of capitalism. Faced with the perception of the body as a tool for making profit, the State desiresmeans to instill in the population the responsibility to conform to the corporal stereotypes not only of aesthetic character, promoting consumerism, but associated with the physical aptitude for work and increase in productivity, adapting itself to the capitalist ideology.