RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Of pipes, persons, and patients
JF Medical Humanities
JO J Med Humanit
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Institute of Medical Ethics
SP 88
OP 91
DO 10.1136/mh.28.2.88
VO 28
IS 2
A1 G M Sayers
YR 2002
UL http://mh.bmj.com/content/28/2/88.abstract
AB Michel Foucault’s analysis of Magritte’s painting, Ceci N’est Pas Une Pipe, and the later work, Les Deux Mystéres, serves as a template, that is broadened to consider different representations of persons and patients. Kant’s noumenal person is contrasted with phenomenal persons, and the well individual is contrasted with the patient. Patients may be considered as the subject or object of illness, and both versions are “imprisoned” within a psychological and social context that curtails freedom, threatens continuity of existence, and may question the nature of their personhood.