Fat Studies

Whilst the idealisation of extreme slenderness is widely recognised as a problematic issue by cultural critiques, psychologists and marketing researchers, the negative portrayal of larger individuals - which can be seen as another side of the same problem - is rarely criticised  for its link with stigmatisation and problems with self-esteem.  In fact, the representation of larger individuals in dehumanising terms is generally regarded as a necessary means to keep individuals on track towards the pursuit or maintenance of body 'normativity' and consequently, 'health'. This presentation will point to an alternative way of considering the 'problem' of fatness, and will argue for the necessity of rehumanising fuller-figured individuals in representation.

This 44-minute film addresses stereotypes that circulate in our homes, with our peers, at primary and secondary schools, on college campuses, in the dating arena, and in mass media. The film directly challenges the rhetoric of the “obesity epidemic,” which serves the $50-60 billion-per-year Diet Industrial Complex more than it improves public health.

In gender studies considerable attention has been paid to the marginalisation of overweight people (Sujata Moorti & Karen Ross 2005) and their stigmatization in our weight-obsessed society. The empowerment of marginalised groups on various social media sites has also been studied (Ciszek 2013), as well as online community interaction having positive effect on self-image negotiation (Tiidenberg 2014). However, within marginalized consumer groups, fashion and identity from a gender point of view is still an under-researched area (e.g. Downing Peters 2014). Plus-sized women have traditionally been viewed as ‘othered’, displaced, and non-hegemonic objects, as subjects without power. Often, plus-sized women are seen as forming a homogeneous group without paying attention to intra-group diversity. 

Drawing on the gender studies literature, particularly the Butlerian notion of undoing gender as resistance, as well as research on identity and self-presentation in social media (e.g. van Dijck 2013), this paper examines identity construction and the struggles of fatshionistas; fatshionistas are plus-sized fashion bloggers, marginalized among fashion bloggers generally but also within the wider norms of Western beauty ideals. Using Bourdieu’s conceptualisation of different types of capital, we argue that fashion and knowledge thereof is a form of social and cultural capital that can be used to position oneself favourably, thereby attaining a more acceptable social role in our society.

The empirical materials of the study consist of twenty fatshion blogs. These blogs form a representative selection of active blogs belonging to what has been called the fatosphere (Scaraboto & Fischer 2013). The authors also consulted Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest using the #fatshionista hashtag to further establish and validate the self-representations resorted to by the fatshionistas. The methods used to analyse both the visual and verbal meanings in the blogs are based on the tradition of critical discourse analysis. CDA allows the examination of culturally diverse material and helps uncover the underlying power positions and struggles affecting the complex mechanisms of identity construction.

A careful analysis of the empirical material revealed different discursive practices employed by the fatshion bloggers in their identity construction: on the one hand, they separate themselves from other fashion bloggers, but on the other hand seek similarity with and acceptance by mainstream fashionistas. The discursive strategies include, for example, separation from the mainstream by reference to the group as fatshionistas instead of fashionistas, thus underlying a difference based on size, yet similarity-seeking by way of visually mimicking and reproducing assumptions and representations associated with fashion that contribute to the narrow female representations. The analysis shows that in their resistance, the fatshionista bloggers nevertheless conform to the traditional representations of women, and thereby effectively act as social gatekeepers controlling the norms of acceptable femininity in the fatosphere. At the same time, by using this strategy the fatshionistas fail to promote equality for all overweight individuals.

Keywords:
Fashion blogs, fatshionista, identity, gender, social capital, plus-size

Employing the social and political ontology of Iris Marion Young, this paper evaluates the claim as to whether or not fat people are subject
to oppression on the basis of their weight. It establishes clear criteria for what constitutes oppression (exploitation, marginalization,
powerlessness, cultural imperialism, and violence), as well as a compelling epistemological argument for the need to evaluate claims of social justice at the level of social groups. Based on an evaluation of the evidence, it can be concluded that fat people are subject to the
systematic forms of oppression Young describes.

Life involves a continuous use of energy, but food intake which supplies that energy is episodic. Feeding is switched on and off by a complex array of predominantly gut derived peptides (and potentially nutrients) that initiate and terminate feeding bouts. Energy is stored as glucose and glycogen to overcome the problem of the episodic nature of intake compared to the continuous demand. Intake is also adjusted to meet immediate changes in demands. Most animals also store energy as fat. In some cases this serves the purpose of storing energy in anticipation of a known future shortfall (e.g. hibernation, migration or reproduction). Other animals, however, store fat in the absence of such anticipated needs, and in this case the fat appears to be stored in preparation for unpredictable catastrophic shortfalls in supply. Fat storage, however, brings disadvantages as well as advantages, in particular an increased risk of predation. Hence many animals seem to have evolved a dual intervention point system preventing them from storing too little or too much. The physiological basis of the lower intervention point is well established, but the upper intervention point is much less studied. Human obesity can potentially be understood in an evolutionary context as due to drift in the upper intervention point following release from predation 2 million years ago (the drifty gene hypothesis), combined with a stimulus in modern society to over-consume calories, possibly attempting to satisfy intake of a limiting micro- or macro-nutrient like protein (the protein leverage hypothesis). 

¿Cómo se ha desarrollado el mercado de talla grande en Chile? ¿Y cómo ha progresado la discusión sobre la aceptación de los gordos? Son preguntas que se resuelven en esta investigación. Se ha reconocido un marcado cambio demográfico en la sociedad chilena y el resto del mundo. Han aumentado las personas con sobrepeso, los que llamamos gordos como si el término los describiera a todos. Esto ocurre a razón de que han sido estigmatizados socialmente.
Un movimiento, fatshionista, se hace representante de los gordos que les gusta la moda pero no encuentran ropa a su gusto en los mercados generales, y además defienden los derechos de los gordos a nivel humano y ciudadano. Se ha generado un choque con los cánones de belleza, lo que ha provocado marginación y rechazo en el mundo de la moda, pero de a poco gracias a una apertura de mente, las gordas han podido integrarse. Sin embargo, no así se ha dado la situación del mundo laboral y la salud, donde aún son marginalizados. 
Los gordos piden protección legislativa, tal como el estado ha protegido a otros grupos estigmatizados, como los homosexuales. Este tema lleva a la discordia (palabra usada en este paper como oposición, desavenencia de voluntades u opiniones).
Un estudio del mercado de talla grande nos lleva a entender las necesidades que este grupo estigmatizado da a conocer: ropa linda a su medida. Diversas empresas en Chile han acogido su reclamo y han tratado de satisfacer sus necesidades de la mejor manera, con una retribución publicitaria y de fidelización.
Detallamos en este paper las diferentes posturas que la gente toma al tratar el tema de la aceptación de los gordos, como también los resultados de esta discordia.
La investigación se ha realizado en mayor medida indagando a través de internet. Leyendo comentarios de medios masivos de comunicación, réplicas de la gente a artículos de redes sociales, blogs de moda, entre otras áreas de discusión online.

n the crowded and busy arena of obesity and fat studies, there is a lack of attention to the lived experiences of people, how and why they eat what they do, and how people in cross-cultural settings understand risk, health, and bodies. This volume addresses the lacuna by drawing on ethnographic methods and analytical emic explorations in order to consider the impact of cultural difference, embodiment, and local knowledge on understanding obesity. It is through this reconstruction of how obesity and fatness are studied and understood that a new discussion will be introduced and a new set of analytical explorations about obesity research and the effectiveness of obesity interventions will be established.

This paper looks at the history and implications of moralizing judgments about bodies in a particular context: the classification and training of students’ bodies in elite preparatory high schools and colleges in the U.S. Drawing on existing literature, historical materials, and primary documents discussing the role of athletics within the preparatory school curriculum, this paper examines the relatively stable ideal of an athletic, “fit” body in elite education alongside the shifting rhetorics defending its value. Those rhetorics range from the eugenics-influenced somatotypes taken at Ivy League colleges in the mid-20th century (Rosenbaum 1995) and the invention of athletic scholarships aimed at limiting Jews’ admission to top colleges (Karabel 2005) to the invocation of meritocracy and neoliberal self-sufficiency in current discourses. Ultimately, I ask whether elite schools help their students “prepare for power” (Cookson and Persell 1985) by providing transferrable skills for later success via an intensive health and physical education curriculum, or whether, like the practitioners of Weber’s Protestant ethic, such students’ body-cultivating practices are meant not to earn them a special status, but to signify that they already have it. The paper concludes by asking about how such practices may contribute to ongoing exclusions of people with a wider range of body shapes and practices (especially women and people of color) in educational settings and in the workforce, where managers in search of new talent are urged to “hire athletes” (Williams 2013).