ABSTRACT
Physiotherapists are used to looking at bodies. They are trained to identify problems in people’s movements and recognize signs of discomfort and distress, but the act of looking is taken for granted in physiotherapy education, practice, and theory. Grounded in the unchallenged dominance of the medical gaze, physiotherapists learn to look upon the body dispassionately and regard the person with objectivity and detachment. But given the growing demands for physiotherapists to be more embodied and engaged with people as people, we ask what kinds of looking will be needed in the future. Drawing on photography as a practice of looking, we define two styles of image commonly seen in the physiotherapy literature, the typical presentation and proper treatment, and consider how these frame the ways physiotherapists think and practice. We contrast these images with examples from contemporary photography to show that other ways of relating are possible and close the chapter with the work of amateur photographer and physiotherapist Frank Weedon. Our argument is that images offer a powerful way to communicate what physiotherapy is, but physiotherapy images promote detachment and the dispassionate medical gaze. Thinking differently about the images might open up physiotherapy to greater empathy and reciprocity.
