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Extending the Neuromatrix

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Life in Pain

Abstract

Early in this chapter I introduce Melzack’s concept of the neuromatrix and then extend it beyond the human brain into a wider metaphor for a cultural neuromatrix. I will extract what I believe are the functional principles underpinning this matrix metaphor (such as organisation, modulation, signature ghosts and interoceptive modelling) and apply these in more abstract terms. The chapter then will progress to the more social and cultural dimensions of the pain neuromatrix. Two articulations of the social dimensions to pain will be described. A key element of the cultural neuromatrix are cultural neurosignatures, the refrains that capture pain and fashion it into specific forms and relationships. In the final section I will introduce the idea that pain is a commodity and underpinning its value as a commodity is its capacity to shapeshift. It is this shapeshifting capacity that reveals the derivative logic to commodity pain.

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  1. School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC, Australia

    John L. Fitzgerald

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Fitzgerald, J.L. (2020). Extending the Neuromatrix. In: Life in Pain. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5640-6_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5640-6_2

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