Replaceable you will change forever the way we think about the cultural and social fallout of world war ii david serlin places disability and visuality together in a brilliant series of meditations on the bodies of the victims of various wars cultural sexual and military and focuses on the way those bodies were reimagined through medical and technical interventions. Replaceable you also struck me as having a special relevance given todays obsession with the body in the popular culture especially evident in television shows like the the swan where plastic surgery is performed on women so as to make them into pageant girls. After world war ii the united states underwent a massive cultural transformation that was vividly realized in the development and widespread use of new medical technologies plastic surgery wonder drugs artificial organs and prosthetics inspired. David serlins book is a stimulating reflection on the cultural implications of modifications to the human body made possible by medical developments after worl we use cookies to enhance your experience on our websiteby continuing to use our website you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Replaceable you revisits this heady era in american history to consider how these medical technologies and procedures were used to advance the politics of conformity during the 1950s praise for replaceable you engineering the body in postwar america