Fat Planet: Obesity, Culture, and Symbolic Body Capital

by Zeyda (Editor), Alexandra Brewis (Editor)

Overview

The average size of human bodies all over the world has been steadily rising over recent decades. The total count of people clinically labeled “obese” is now at least three times what it was in 1980. Fat Planet represents a collaborative effort to consider at a global scale what fat stigma is and what it does to people. Making use of an array of social science perspectives applied in multiple settings, the authors examine the interplay of weight, wealth, history, culture, and meaning to fat and its social rejection. They explore the notion of symbolic body capital—the power of non-fat bodies to do what people need or want. In so doing, they illustrate the complex and quickly shifting dynamics in thinking about fat—often considered personal yet powerfully influenced by and influential upon the broader world in which we live.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780826358004
Publisher:	University of New Mexico Press Published in Association with School for Advanced Research Press
Publication date:	04/01/2017
Series:	School for Advanced Research Advanced Seminar Series
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Eileen P. Anderson-Fye directs the Medical Humanities and Social Medicine Initiative at Case Western Reserve University, where she also is an associate professor of bioethics and the leader of the Medicine, Society and Culture track of the School of Medicine’s bioethics master’s degree program.

Alexandra Brewis is a President’s Professor and a Distinguished Sustainability Scientist at Arizona State University, where she also co-leads the translational Mayo Clinic–ASU Obesity Solutions initiative and serves as associate vice president of Social Sciences.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations vii

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction Making Sense of the New Global Body Norms Alexandra Brewis 1

Chapter 1 From Thin to Fat and Back Again: A Dual Process Model of the Big Body Mass Reversal Daniel J. Hruschka 15

Chapter 2 Managing Body Capital in the Fields of Labor, Sex, and Health Alexander Edmonds Ashley Mears 33

Chapter 3 Fat and Too Fat: Risk and Protection for Obesity Stigma in Three Countries Eileen P. Anderson-Fye Stephanie M. McClure Maureen Floriano Arundhati Bharati Yunzhu Chen Caryl James 49

Chapter 4 Excess Gains and Losses: Maternal Obesity, Infant Mortality, and the Biopolitics of Blame Monica J. Casper 79

Chapter 5 Symbolic Body Capital of an "Other" Kind: African American Females as a Bracketed Subunit in Female Body Valuation Stephanie M. McClure 97

Chapter 6 Fat Is a Linguistic Issue: Discursive Negotiation of Power, Identity, and the Gendered Body among Youth Nicole L. Taylor 125

Chapter 7 Body Size, Social Standing, and Weight Management: The View from Fiji Anne E. Becker 149

Chapter 8 Glocalizing Beauty: Weight and Body Image in the New Middle East Sarah Trainer 171

Conclusion Fat Matters: Capital, Markets, and Morality Rebecca J. Lester Eileen P. Anderson-Fye 193

References 205

Contributors 251

Index 253