Surgical dissection

“Dissection aims to present organs in the isolating style of an anatomic atlas. The drawings show neatly separated organs; in the patient-body this state must first be produced by isolating them with the knife. Surgeons call this ‘exposition’ or ‘making anatomy’ (Anatomie herstellen). Whereas, to a layperson, this procedure increasingly disfigures ‘the body’ – as it is known from everyday life – for the surgeon exposition creates ‘the body’ – as it is known from the anatomy book” (Hirschauer, 301; cf. Selzer, Mortal Lessons, 95). . . . “One ‘leafs through’ the three-dimensional patient-body to find the two-dimensional structure of anatomical pictures. Section after section, the proper anatomy of the ideal body is engraved on these layers. . . . The anatomical body is the result of a sculptured practice. [para] “So the relationship between the patient-body and anatomical body is reflexive: they are models for one another. On the one hand, the concrete body is a didactic model, from which the abstract body is learnt; on the other hand, the anatomical body is an aesthetic model, which is an example to the patient-body and its treatment [PS: which guides the surgeon in understanding the patient-body before him and implementing a surgical form of treatment]. Focused on the issue representation, this means: in surgery ‘transference happens not only between pictures, but between pictures and ‘natural objects.’ This results in a reflexivity of similitude: ‘there is no ultimate reference point. Representational relations are symmetric and can be reversed and extended without limit. In this harmonious circularity, surgical practice takes place. It explores a body which it must already presuppose and take for granted, and it standardizes itself by means of its decontextualized anatomical knowledge” (312, quoting Lynch & Woolgar, “Sociological Orientations to Representational Practice in Science” Human Studies, 11 ([1988], who are referring to Foucault’s This is not a Pipe [1982]).