How bodies matter: Yesterday’s America today

Abstract

The article takes its cue from the statement in the original essay, “Trump’s body matters,” and considers examples of how different kinds of bodies were demonstrated to matter in candidate Trump’s campaign discourse. With his “Make America Great Again” slogan in mind, the article tacks back and forth between Trump’s campaign discourse on black, brown, and female bodies and various forms of violence and discipline exercised in America’s racialized past, which threaten to return under the new administration. It is argued that questions of racialization and belonging are central to defining how bodies matter in the America that Trump proposes.