Reflection on the process and degrees of embodiment of lower and upper limb prostheses
Résumé
Far from being a "simple" palliation of the amputated limb, the prosthesis is a complex object that
deeply questions the boundaries of the body. The experience of amputation produces a rupture in the
body image as well as a global modification of the body structure and schema. All body balances,
postures and habits are modified following the amputation of a limb. Faced with this brutal
reconfiguration (loss of limb, stump healing, phantom pain sensations) and the irreversible trauma of
amputation, amputees must learn to rebuild themselves through the use of prosthetic devices, which
have the double objective of rebalancing the body and making it functional again. This learning and
acceptance of prosthetic devices in limb amputees is a long and singular process that raises many
questions: how do amputees learn to use and live with a prosthesis? How do they manage to
appropriate a material object that is foreign to the body, through various adjustment and
accommodation processes? How do they feel and incorporate it into their body image and schema?
Do they succeed (or not) in embodying it and making it a "prosthesis" as such?
Through the prisms of philosophical reflections, particularly phenomenological researches on
amputation, and socio-anthropological approaches, the analysis of prosthetic experiences invites us to
go beyond the notion of prosthesis as a “simple” object "added" to the body. From an apprehension
of the prosthesis as a "tool", to its perception as an "extension of the body", various processes and
degrees of embodiment of the prosthetic device are gradually emerging in people’s experiences with
lower and upper limb amputations.
By cross-analysing the discourse of amputees and observations from fieldwork, we will study these
processes and degrees of embodiment as they are experienced after amputation: in the short term
during the initial period in the rehabilitation centre, then in the medium and long terms when
amputees return home, to society and daily life. We will interrogate how the prosthesis needs to be
conceived from and beyond its materiality.