J.M. 쿳시의 『마이클 K의 삶과 시대』: 먹기와 단식의 윤리학

This paper aims to explore the ethical and political aspects of eating and fasting in J.M. Coetzee's novel, Life & Times of Michael K. The novel demonstrates the strategies of bio-power used to control the bodies of racial minority and to confine them in labour camps in apartheid South Africa. Categorized as idle and accused of being like a parasite, the eponymous protagonist is interned in labour camps, but he continues to escape. The escapee also refuses to eat and to speak in the camps. K's escape and refusal can be considered as a form of resistance against the oppressive social and political landscape of apartheid South Africa. However, Michael Hart and Antonio Negri criticize K's refusal as the novel's limitation since his fasting leads only to a kind of social suicide. Nevertheless, K's fasting provides a potentiality for subverting the logic of camps, which are designed for people without jobs or food. Additionally, K's fasting can be regarded as an ethical and political method of engaging with the escape from exploitation of the bodies of the Other, including animals and minorities. Consequently, K experiences the bodily transformation, as his fasting deterritorizes the body in the camps, which otherwise force minorities to labour for food.