Resumo

MUNIZ, Elsa. La cirugía cosmética: Productora de mundos posibles. Una mirada a la realidad mexicana. Estud. - Cent. Estud. Av., Univ. Nac. Córdoba [online]. 2012, n.27, pp.119-132. ISSN 1852-1568.

Perfection is the «truth of body» both in women and men; but in women's bodies, beauty is rule and truth.The pursuit of perfection passes through diverse bodily devices, including cosmetic surgery where the most significant is its claim to normalize the body of women and men by appealing to ideals of beauty defined from the mass media or from operating rooms of surgeons. The boom of cosmetic surger y today is also caused by a conception of the human body as the space where subjectivity is constructed, where individual agency manufactures identity. The pursuit of beauty and bodily perfection, particularity for women, is associated to success, social upward mobility, and to better living conditions, perhaps also to achieving a good job or a good marriage, to the «raise of self-esteem» and to perennial youth.

Palavras-chave : bodily devices; cosmetic surgery; body; beauty; perfection.