Intended to relate contemporary attitudes toward the representation of the human body with some aspects of the ongoing debate on postmodernism, this paper begins by briefly discussing the work of Michel Foucault during the modern period (1790-1950). A review of the particular ways in which Foucault relates the body to ideas of power relations, together with a review of the literature on ways in which postmodernism deals with similar problems in contemporary society, provides the basis for investigating how a synthesis of the two approaches could give a theoretical basis for an analysis of the representation of the body in this new postmodern world. Examples taken from television commercials in which the human body is featured in some way are used to illustrate postmodern attitudes toward the representation of the body. The paper concludes by arguing that there is an urgent need to monitor, analyze, and intervene in discourses related to new technologies, the body, and pleasures; a need to review the language and the object of criticism; and a need to theorize the new forms that power relations take. (50 end notes) (CGD)