Written in a jargon-free way, Body Matters provides a clear and accessible phenomenological critique of core assumptions in mainstream biomedicine and explores ways in which health and illness are experienced and interpreted differently in various socio-historical situations. By drawing on the disciplines of literature, cultural anthropology, sociology, medical history, and philosophy, the authors attempt to dismantle common presuppositions we have about human afflictions and examine how the methods of phenomenology open up new ways to interpret the body and to re-envision therapy.

Kevin Aho is Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Communication and Philosophy at Florida Gulf Coast University. He is the author of Existentialism: An Introduction (Polity, 2014), Heidegger's Neglect of the Body (SUNY Press, 2009), and co-author of Body Matters: A Phenomenology of Sickness, Illness, and Disease (Lexington Books, 2008).

Chapter 1 Preface Chapter 2 1. Foundations Chapter 3 2. The Lived-Body Chapter 4 3. The Accelerated Body and Its Pathologies Chapter 5 4. The Sicknesses of Society Chapter 6 5. The Diseases of Medicine Chapter 7 6. The Agonies of Illness Chapter 8 7. Medicine and Phenomenology Chapter 9 8. Recovering Therapy Chapter 10 9. Conclusion