the Female Body GOVERNING

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samantha king
to encourage the study of the “growing number of cancer veterans.”
In 1998, the American Cancer Society and the Komen Foundation
followed their lead with the launch of similar efforts.
This short history offers an indication of the extent to which the
empowered patient—the activist-expert, the survivor—has become
institutionalized and incorporated into the fabric of the cancer establishment.
This is nowhere more clear than in the case of breast cancer.
The movement remains extraordinarily diverse, with support groups,
grassroots collectives, charities, national lobbying organizations, corporations,
and federal agencies working both in alliance and independently
to shape the course of the disease. But breast cancer groups that embrace
patient-empowerment as a way to mobilize critical engagement with
biomedical research, anger at governmental inaction, and resistance
to social discrimination—Breast Cancer Action in San Francisco, for
instance, or the Women’s Community Cancer Project in Cambridge,
Massachusetts—are marginalized in mainstream discourse on the
disease. Instead, and as the two case studies that follow show, the version
of the breast cancer survivor that prevails in the national imaginary
is used to mobilize fund-raising for high-stakes, cure-driven scientifi c
research on the disease; to validate—usually without questioning—scientifi
c authority and expertise; and to market an ever-increasing number
of goods to consumers eager to play their part in the fi ght against the
disease. The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation’s Race for the
Cure has been a central actor in the development of this particular
confi guration of the breast cancer survivor—a confi guration that relies
on and in turn reproduces an unbridled optimism about life with and
beyond the disease and, concurrently, an obstinate refusal to question
the status quo.
The Race for the Cure
Seven hundred women took part in the fi rst Susan G. Komen Breast
Cancer Foundation Race for the Cure in Dallas, Texas, in October 1983. 5
By 1999 the race was the nation’s largest 5K series with events in 99
cities across the United States. Between 1988 and 1999, participation
in the series increased tenfold to nearly 600,000, grew by 44% between
1997 and 1998 alone, and reached 1.4 million in 2005. The National
Race for the Cure, held in Washington, DC, each June, is now the biggest
5K run in the world. In addition to the numbers who participate, the
appeal of the Race for the Cure is apparent in its capacity to attract
high-profi le corporate sponsors, as well as the support and attendance
of politicians and celebrities at events across the United States. 6