Breasted experience

the look and the feeling

Iris M. Young

pp. 215-230

in: Drew Leder (ed), The body in medical thought and practice, Berlin, Springer, 1992

Abstract

The chest, the house of the heart, is an important center of a person's being. I may locate my consciousness in my head, but my self, my existence as a solid person in the world, starts from my chest, from which I feel myself rise and radiate ([28] pp. 22–27; [13], Ch. 27). At least in Euro-American culture, it is to my chest, not my face, that I point when I signify myself. In Hindu philosophy of the body the chest is not the only center, but it has the integrative power among them ([11], pp. 132–135).