ABSTRACT
Live sociology implicates bodies, senses and feelings, the articulations between them, and their role in producing, mediating and conveying subjectivities and social relations. Its investigations push up against the spatial, temporal and material conditions of embodied emergence and existence. In this chapter, the author proposes that this involves utilising embodied methods, which includes an explicit acknowledgement of embodied dis/investments in (live) research practices. She looks at the political work of live body art, beginning with feminist practice from the 1960s, before 'body art' was really considered 'a thing', and then moves on to consider in depth the performances of selected queer artists. Following existing scholarship in performance studies, the author also proposes that the affective and embodied encounter brought about by work such as this provides possibilities for ethical spectatorship. She considers her experiences of Cassils' live performance and film, Inextinguishable Fire.
