The Gifts of the Body the patients and the caregiver. The book contains ten short stories, the titles of each being associated with "gifts" which are various functions of the body, both physical and emotional: sweat, wholeness, tears, skin, hunger, mobility, death, speech, sight, hope, and mourning. The caregiver experiences each "gift", as he/she deals with patients who have AIDS, showing the different shared relationships in each case. Each patient is a distinct case, differing in terms of age, financial situation, attitude toward the illness etc., showing the reader that this disease affects all types of people. The book is written in the "no-frills style"
Sociology of the body of the Structuralist approach in the twentieth century. Especially important within the sociology of the body tradition is the sociology of health and illness. This is because illness may obviously reduce the level of normal functioning of the body. Also, increasingly people in society believe that illness is prevented by fulfilling activities leading to a healthy body (thus changing one's lifestyle) such as dieting and exercise, as well as avoiding anything that can cause damage to the body, like smoking. Moreover, medical science is now able to alter our bodies through plastic surgery, transplanting organs, reproductive aids and even change