"Provides a fulfilling and imaginative traversal of the many landscapes of touch. Constance Classen's deft introductions provide both context for, and commentary on, a constellation of texts - academic and literary, historical and contemporary - whose appearance makes a major contribution to the burgeoning study of the senses."--Tim Barringer, Yale University

"Get your hands on The Book of Touch. Constance Classen has put together a wonderfully varied anthology on the cultural formations of tactility across vast expanses of time and place. Standing as a sourcebook on everything from kissing to healing to wrestling to scratching, it is without rival."--Leigh E. Schmidt, Princeton University

Product Description

From the tortures of the Inquisition to the corporeal comforts of modernity and from the tactile therapies of Asian medicine to the virtual tactility of cyberspace, The Book of Touch offers excursions into a sensory territory both foreign and familiar. How are masculine and feminine identities shaped by touch? What are the tactile experiences of the blind, or the autistic? How is touch developed differently across cultures? What are the boundaries of pain and pleasure? Is there a politics of touch? Bringing together classic writings and new work, this is an essential guide for anyone interested in the body, the senses and the experiential world.