Essay on self-directed violence: the role of the body in political protests

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Role of the body in political protests, Social and political protests, ranging from Palestinian resistance to ‘dirty protests,’ have always been considered as one of the most effective ways to express opposition or public opinion. In this context, the use of violence, directed at oneself, has also proved to be a powerful weapon in the revolt against oppressive systems of government and political powers (Chenoweth & Stephan, 2014). Various social and political movements around the world have adopted such tactics to pressure their opponents (Harlow, 2012).

The human body, therefore, sometimes presents itself as a lethal weapon which can be used to offer resistance and coerce opponents into compliance or agreement. However, the human experience of individual physical suffering, the motives behind such actions, and the socio-cultural underpinnings of self-directed violence, largely remains under-discussed.

A disproportionately large number of academic researchers have studied the role of the body in social and political action. However, few anthropological researchers have focused on the relationship between the body and self-directed violence as a way to forward a social cause or political struggle.

As Sasson-Levy & Rapoport (2003) agree on the need to acknowledge the body as a critical agent for propagating “social and political change”, this paper will attempt to discuss and analyse the role of the body in the advancement of a political protest through self-directed violence. It will examine different cases from cross-cultural contexts – including cases of self-starvation, Role of the body in political protests Role of the body in political protests self-immolation and suicide bombing – in order to demonstrate the use of the body as a weapon for triggering social or political change. Further, this paper will try to understand the social, cultural, and political underpinnings of such actions that aim to express a sense of rebelliousness through self-harm.

It is considered pertinent to start the discussion with the case of Ireland. The use of hunger strikes for social, economic and political agendas has been a crucial part of the Irish history (McDowell, Braniff & Murphy, 2015). Between the twentieth and twenty first centuries, Ireland witnessed several hunger strikes on a considerably large scale. Sweeney (1993) quotes one of the earliest hunger strikes witnessed in Ireland in 1923 in response to the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty. The hunger strike involved more than 8000 Irish prisoners, demonstrating a substantial opposition to the proposed treaty. Although, ultimately the hunger strike was brought to a halt, two prisoners died as a result of the collective action. Thereafter, Ireland experienced further hunger strikes in the following years, which has led to Sweeney (1993) suggesting a central status of hunger strikes in Irish mythology and history.

The use of hunger strikes as part of political protests is not a new phenomenon in Ireland and as Sweeney (1993) suggests, the tradition has a link with Irish…