OBJECTIFICATION OF INFANTILE BODIES: UNDERSTANDING THE BIOPOLITICS OF ANTEBELLUM AMERICA THROUGH BABY SHOWS

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the function of baby shows in antebellum America in instigating binary logic of gender in family, child rearing, objectification of both infantile and maternal bodies; all of which are closely tied to the biopolitics of the antebellum America. This study will first look at the biopolitical aspects of the first baby shows organized as part of agricultural fairs in 1854 by focusing on the coverage of such events by newspaper articles. Then it will follow Phineas Taylor Barnum’s re-introduction of baby shows along with his freak shows in 1855 for commercial success. In Barnum’s shows, this study finds, the reproduction of properly bred white American babies is promoted through questionnaires and examinations of doctors in the evaluation of babies as well as the mothers to instill a eugenic normalcy with regards to determining the qualities of the best American baby. Lastly, the juxtaposition of the abnormal “freaks” and “oddities” with “cherubic” babies is realized through Barnum’s American museum which, as this study will argue, serves as a heterotopia in the sense that Barnum’s museum attempts to establish and thereby instigate a discursive historical truth of the proper middle-class American family in the form of a myth by exercising the power/knowledge over the American family as a heterotopian authority.