ABSTRACT
The socio-cultural context is clearly integral to how we might formulate an understanding of the body in pain. After all, pain is a type of event that involves not only sensation, but also cognition, affect, and motivational aspects. As Anthony Synnott describes, the body has been contemplated in a range of ways throughout history. What this tells us is that pain is not only a subjective physical sensation in a purely individual way but also that it is dynamic in that it can be interpreted differently at a social level at different socio-historical times. Bourke provides an extensive account of the history of social understanding of pain. Her focus is on the broader general interpretation of pain in terms of suffering and its relationship to the human condition. Bourke describes how the formulation of the McGill Pain Questionnaire provided a way of using language to assist medical practitioners with their diagnoses of illness and disease.
