Strange bodies – Passionate bodies. An approach to the socio-spatial configuration in the context of Shakespeare´s Venice and Charles Fourier´s Phalanstère

Abstract

This article outlines some keys in order to discuss the processes that configure capitalists citie's body categorization. It explores the relationship between bodies, urban structure and social structure in two peculiar socio-spatial configurations: Shakespeare's Venice and Charles Fourier's Phalanstère. First of all, we look at The Merchant of Venice emphasizing the ways in which social estrangement and distance affect (and are subsidiaries of) the configuration of spaces reserved for the strange bodies held within the walls of the Jewish ghetto. Secondly, we look at Phalanstère, a project aimed at reconfiguring social bonds on the basis of the pleasure and desires repressed by industrial reason in the early 19 th century.