Weighty Issues: Fatness and Thinness as Social Problems

Description

Many people consider their weight to be a personal problem; when, then, does body weight become a social problem? Until recently, the major public concern was whether enough food was consistently available. As food systems began to provide ample and stable amounts of food, questions about food availability were replaced with concerns about "ideal" weights and appearance. These interests were aggregated into public concerns about defining people as "too fat" and "too thin."Social constructionist perspectives can contribute to the understanding of weight problems because they focus attention on how these problems are created, maintained, and promoted within various social environments. While there is much objectivist research concerning weight problems, few studies address the socially constructed aspects of fatness and thinness.This book however draws from and contributes to social constructionist perspectives. The chapters in this volume offer several perspectives that can be used to understand the way society deals with fatness and thinness. The contributors consider historical foundations, medical models, gendered dimensions, institutional components, and collective perspectives. These different perspectives illustrate the multifaceted nature of obesity and eating disorders, providing examples of how a variety of social groups construct weight as a social problem. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Table of Contents Preface Part I Introduction 1 Body Weight as a Social Problem Part II Historical Foundations 2 Children and Weight Control: Priorities in the United States and France 3 Fat Boys and Goody Girls: Hilde Bruch's Work on Eating Disorders and the American Anxiety about Democracy, 1930-1960 Part III Medical Models 4 Constitutional Types, Institutional Forms: Reconfiguring Diagnostic and Therapeutic Approaches to Obesity in Early TwentiethCentury Biomedical Investigation 5 Defining Perfect and Not-So-Perfect Bodies: The Rise and Fall of the "Dreyer Method" for the Assessment of Physique and Fitness, 1918-26 Part IV Gendered Dimensions 6 Ideal Weight/Ideal Women: Society Constructs the Female 7 Dieting Women: Self-Surveillance and the Body Panopticon 8 Fleshing Out the Discomforts of Femininity: The Parallel Cases of Female Anorexia and Male Compulsive Bodybuilding Part V Institutional Components 9 Commodity Knowledge in Consumer Culture: The Role of Nutritional Health Promotion in the Making of the Diet Industry 10 Meanings of Weight among Dietitians and Nutritionists Part VI Collective Processes 11 Too Skinny or Vibrant and Healthy?: Weight Management in the Vegetarian Movement 12 The Size Acceptance Movement and the Social Construction of Body Weight Biographical Sketches of the Contributors Index