62 © 2016, Horizons in Humanities and Social Sciences: An International Refereed Journal HSS-CHSS-UAEU, ISSN 2413-6301 The Body: A Very Short Introduction By: Chris Shilling New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2016, xv+120pp Pbk $11.95 ISBN: 978-0198739036 Review by el-Sayed el-Aswad United Arab Emirates University eelaswad@uaeu.ac.ae Although much has been written about the body, Shilling’s book is a timely and straightforward book that draws together both classical and contemporary literature dealing with the body. The book, through applying a meticulous interdisciplinary approach associated with a certain convergence between the social sciences and the biological sciences, provides a critical analysis of the human body refuting Western paradigms that elevate the mind over the body (or senses) and ignore the physical aspects of social and personal existence. Chris Shilling contends that focusing on the body can lead to a unique and rigorous approach for the analysis of society, history, culture and identity. He also maintains that bodies are important practical as well as intellectual matters where thought and action occur through our embodied being. After addressing the main themes of the book in the Introduction, the author devotes six chapters to tackling different dimensions of the body. These chapters, respectively, are: “Natural bodies or social bodies?” “Sexed bodies,” “Governing bodies,” “Educating bodies,” “Bodies as commodities,” and “Bodies matter: dilem- mas and controversies.” The chapters and topics being addressed share in common three themes pro- viding direction to the main arguments in the book. The first theme relates to the significance of social and technological forces in informing and changing the bio- logical constitution of the embodied being. According to Shilling, the development of specific cosmetic surgery procedures, for instance, has been impacted by the exis- tence of socio-economic and political inequalities between different people.