The inhuman body in the human world: Corporations and contemporary culture

In this unit, you will explore the relationship between humans, cultures and the corporation. Drawing on social science and humanities-based  analysis of corporate activity in western and non-western settings, you will critically examines the nature of sociability inherent to the corporation, and the effects corporations have upon culture and social life. We approach corporations not as givens, but as social products that can be compared to other cultural forms. You will engage with case studies of communities that have attempted something very difficult: to live free of the influence of corporations.

We will cover the emergence of the legal and commercial arrangements that form the modern corporation; the benefits corporations have brought to human societies; the effects of those legal and commercial arrangements on human life in areas such as time, gender, social structures, family and work; the strategies that humans have implemented as resistance to corporatisation, and; the ongoing projects of boundary-making through which humans try to protect and insulate domains of life from corporate activity.