Rosengarten, Marsha. 2023. Perplexity as a provocation: revisiting the role of metaphor as a ‘place holder’ for the potential of COVID-19 antibodies. Medical Humanities, 49, pp. 64-69. ISSN 1468-215X [Article]

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Abstract or Description

This article revisits long-standing critiques of the role of metaphor in immunological discourse. Drawing on Alfred North Whitehead’s speculative philosophy of organism, I focus on the use of metaphor to explain the process by which COVID-19 vaccine research is able to generate protective antibodies, the challenge of autoimmune disease and dengue fever antibodies. I suggest that metaphors are provoked by the perplexity that arises from presupposing that distinct morphological substances are the first order of reality. I conclude that rather than seeing metaphors as typically skewing conceptions of the body, as has been previously argued, those of memory, recognition and misrecognition may be instructive of a body in transition. Indeed, a process of transition that shows degrees of creativity. When gesturing towards the processual nature of infection and immunity, metaphors invite new modes of shared thinking across the disciplinary divide.

Item Type:	Article
Identification Number (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1136/medhum-2021-012343
Additional Information:	Funded by Australian Research Council Award Number: DP210101604.
Keywords:	Covid-19, Metaphors, Immunological discourse, A.N. Whitehead, Perplexity
Departments, Centres and Research Units:	Sociology > Centre for the Study of Invention and Social Process (CSISP)
Dates:	Date Event 10 May 2022 Accepted 30 May 2022 Published Online 2023 Published
Item ID:	31866
Date Deposited:	14 Jun 2022 15:28
Last Modified:	14 Mar 2023 11:35
Peer Reviewed:	Yes, this version has been peer-reviewed.
URI:	https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/31866

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