Broken Bodies Summary

Seth Holmes’ methodology as described in his book, Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies, was that of embodiment and participant observation. With this methodology, Holmes used his own body as an ethnographic tool to understand the situations into which he entered, including picking berries with the Triqui pickers on the Tanaka Farm in the Skagit Valley of Washington state. This gave him a distinct advantage, given that one of his goals was to understand the way farm labor affects the health of the Triqui people: it altered his perspective. This is evident in the way he wrote the ethnography; Holmes’ book included his own experiences in addition to those he witnessed and discussed with his companions. Having his own perspective on these experiences allowed …show more content…
These men’s conditions are the result of the paths that they were channeled into through the structural racism that keeps them in their pre-determined boxes. It’s a circular institution: the type of work they are able to do is determined by their social status and education, and the social status and education they are able to obtain is determined by the work they can do. Because of the circular pathway better known as structural racism, the Triqui people are have no mobility to advance up the social hierarchy. They are unable to receive the healthcare and healing they need because farmers don’t pay Workman’s Compensation. In the case of Abelino, structural racism made his injury worse because he couldn’t afford to take the days off that he needed to recover, and was forced back into full labor soon after his …show more content…
He makes it clear that in each case, the issue is that of the decontextualizing of each man’s problem from their situation. The clinical gaze separates the “person” from the body, and is the result of doctor’s training to see humans as bodies and anatomical parts, but not as people. This removes the person from the context from which their problem is a product, and leads to the doctors needing to see the pain to believe that it is real. For example, when Abelino had his knee X-rayed, the picture told that doctor that there was nothing wrong with the knee. Then, when an MRI revealed soft tissue inflammation, the doctor told him to change the way he does his job, and Abelino was granted compensation for lost work for a short time. Because this problem was clearly the fault of Abelino, and not the situation into which he had been forced by the social hierarchy and institutional racism he lived at the bottom of, the doctor did nothing more for