An Exploration of Touch

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Touch is an interesting sense to think about. Out of all of the senses I feel that the sense of touch is one that I am both very aware of, but also not aware of at all. When thinking about the sense of touch I first think of my pets. I have a pet rabbit with such incredibly soft fur. While he is not a very fluffy animal, his fur still feels so silky and soft. Along with this I think of my puppy. There's something special about petting a young puppy, there is a distinct softness of a puppy's coat. Along with pets, the sensation of a loved one's touch like a hug is something so comforting. In times where
My puppy, Charlie
social distancing is the new social norm, I think we can all connect in some way to this recognition of how important touch actually is to us in our lives.

© Nastya
This awareness of the comforting sensation of touch is interesting when contrasted with how numb we can become to touch. Ackerman describes this in A Natural History of the Senses and it is something I had never recognized before. While we are so aware of the softness of a pet or the comfort of a hug, we also can become very disconnected from touch. Unlike our vision, our sense of touch can stop working. Ackerman describes how we begin to ignore sensations such as the touch of our clothing. Ackerman states that items applying constant pressures such as clothing "register at first, activating the touch receptors; then the receptors stop working" (Ackerman, 80). With our eyesight our eyes are always taking in visual inputs unless our eyes our closed, yet with touch we can become desensitized to the simple things around us.

Beyond these physical aspects of touch, there are many more abstract elements of touch that make it such an interesting sense to analyze. On another level, touch can be connected to the language we use and also can be seen in religious beliefs. Ackerman describes how our language is "steeped in metaphors of touch" and we utilize this language to describe many things in our lives (Ackerman, 70). One area where elements of such vocabulary can be seen is in Christianity as Constance Classen describes in The Deepest Sense: A Cultural History of Touch. In a more metaphorical sense, Classen points out how tactile metaphors have been utilized in the descriptions of faith, stating that in a description of the soul's understanding of the "Unknowable" it was described as "better felt than seen" (Classen, 30). The use of "felt" in this description connects to Ackerman's observations on the use of tactile vocabulary. Beyond tactile descriptions of faith, the role of touch can be seen in the Bible. Classen describes how the "physical nature of Jesus' body brought God firmly into the realm of human experience and tangibility" (Classen, 29). Along with the tangibility of Jesus that Classen describes, the role of touch can be seen in the Bible specifically with the healing touch of Jesus. Through Classen's descriptions of the role of touch within the Bible and faith; along with Ackerman's observations of the role of touch in vocabulary and the physical sensations of touch, the multifaceted nature of the sense can be observed. Touch plays a very critical role within our lives in many different ways.

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