Leviathan and the Breast Pump: Toward an Embodied Rhetoric of Wearable Technology

Rhetoric Society Quarterly May 2016

Leviathan and the Breast Pump: Toward an Embodied Rhetoric of Wearable Technology

Jordynn Jack University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Abstract

In this essay, I develop a feminist framework for analyzing wearable technologies as embodied rhetorics, one that considers (1) how wearable technologies enable micro-performances of gender, status, and identity; (2) how wearable technologies are embedded in policy/political frameworks as well as scientific/medical ones; (3) how wearable technologies are embedded in spatiotemporal networks of actors, objects, and so on; and (4) how the design of technological objects themselves do or do not live up to the promises of wearability and mobility. Using an analysis of the breast pump as my case and drawing from interviews with women about their experiences, I show how the breast pump crystallizes a network of rhetorics that is both disruptive and productive of gendered differences. In particular, the breast pump presents rhetorical arguments for returning to work soon after childbirth while performing a professional role. At the same time, this technology makes an argument for including nursing bodies on college campuses, spaces that have not historically considered those bodies or their needs.

Journal: Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Published: 2016-05-26
DOI: 10.1080/02773945.2016.1171691
Open Access: Closed
Topics: body and rhetoric

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (7)

Stone et al. (2025)

The Material-Discursive Realities of Mobile Menstruation Tracking Apps in a Pos…

Technical Communication Quarterly
Campeau (2022)

Vaccination Double Bind: A Study of Pregnancy and COVID-19 Vaccine Decision-Making

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Swacha (2021)

Living Visual-voice as a Community-based Social Justice Research Method in Tech…

Technical Communication Quarterly
Peters (2021)

My Body, My Cells: Rhetoric and the Molecularization of the Human

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
McCaughey (2021)

The Rhetoric of Online Exclusive Pumping Communities: Tactical Technical Commun…

Technical Communication Quarterly

Show all 7 →

LeMesurier (2020)

Winking at Excess: Racist Kinesiologies in Childish Gambino’s “This Is America”

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Gouge et al. (2018)

Wearable Technologies and Invention

Rhetoric Review

Cites in this index (2)

Koerber (2000)

Toward a Feminist Rhetoric of Technology

Journal of Business and Technical Communication
Durack (1997)

Gender, Technology, and the History of Technical Communication

Technical Communication Quarterly

Also cites 5 works outside this index ↓

10.1080/15362426.2012.657044

↗
Koerber Amy. (2013)

Breast or Bottle?: Contemporary Controversies in Infant-Feeding Policy and Practice

↗
Pedersen Isabel. (2005)

10.1515/semi.2005.2005.155.1part4.183

Semiotica ↗
Ryan Alan S. (2006)

10.1016/j.whi.2006.08.001

Women’s Health Issues ↗
Stearns Cindy A. (2009)

10.1353/wsq.0.0184

Women’s Studies Quarterly ↗

CrossRef global citation count: 19 View in citation network →