During the nineteenth century, the development of humanities and social sciences frequently relied on binary frameworks, which delineated concepts into opposing pairs such as the sacred and the secular, community and society, tradition and modernity, identity and class, nature and culture, and others. This dualistic mindset also constrained the early exploration of body studies within similar dichotomous boundaries. Starting with Plato, through Descartes to Hegel, the body and mind were discussed in a dualistic perspective. In particular, Descartes developed mind–body dualism to the extreme with his classic quote “I think, therefore I am”, which conveys his view of man as a spiritual being. Descartes depreciated the human body even more than Plato did. According to Descartes, the soul and the body were completely separate from and opposed to each other. The study of the body in anthropology went beyond the nature/culture and mind/body dichotomies to examine the bodily expressions of local societies based on field data from different cultures.