On judgement day: Anorexic and obese women’s phenomenological experience of the body, food and eating

2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 259-279 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fiona J Moola ◽  
Moss E Norman

In contemporary Western society, both anorexic and obese 1 bodies are regarded to be “out of bounds.” Although scholars have enhanced our understanding of anorexia and obesity, these “disorders” have most often been studied in isolation from one another. In this article, we examine the similarities and differences in the embodied experiences of anorexic and obese women. Informed by the phenomenological research tradition, we follow in the footsteps of other scholars who have already begun to depart from binarized, polarized views by describing how women living with anorexia and obesity in two Canadian provinces experience the body, food and eating. Anorexic and obese women described a vast range of intense emotional experiences to characterize their relationship to food, the body and eating. Shame marked the bodies of these women. Family relationships also changed how the women experienced the body and food over time. The women ascribed a diverse array of complex meanings to the body and food. We hope that our study opens new phenomenological terrain to dialogue with and for anorexic and obese bodies in a relational way, recognizing that both of these bodies hurt in a remarkably similar manner. In a judgement day of sorts, both anorexic and obese bodies carry the heavy burden of culture’s expectations to fit within a narrow range of normative slenderness.

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerie M Sheach Leith

This article experiments with some of the insights provided by the work of Deleuze and Guattari as a move towards deterritorializing fat bodies. This is necessary because in contemporary Western society the fat [female] body is positioned and frequently experienced as lacking in social, cultural and political value and as being in need of surveillance and control, not least by the neo-liberal ‘self’. This article is a response to Deleuze and Guattari's plea to ‘think differently’, in this case about fat and weight loss. The article eschews the paradigmatic form of the traditional academic research paper, adopting a semi autoethnographic approach to present an analysis of my engagement with the Biggest Loser (diet) Club. Thinking through rather than about the body it focuses on embodied experiences of fat and the on-going process of cutting that body down to ‘normal’ size. By utilising two central concepts in Deleuzoguattarian thought – ‘becoming’ and the ‘body – without – organs’ (BwO) - I seek to demonstrate the embodied, theoretical and ethical potential of utilising Deleuze and Guattari's work to explore fat and weight loss and how this might productively serve to deterritorialize contemporary discourses which stigmatise fat bodies.


2017 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 299-310
Author(s):  
Fernando Augusto Silva Lopes

This article is based on a report about cultural industries and their reflexes on media saturation. From that point, a reflection on technology, media and contemporary arts is presented, especially on the role of the body in the manifestation of art. This work seeks to ratify the influence of technology, of mass media and of information over the construction of the contemporary cultural values. It also provides a reflection on current contemporary artistic practices as elements that seek to evidence and question the standardizing influence of mass media and of the market. The background for the development of this article is the evolution of technologies, which expand the commodification of culture and make possible the deep social and cultural changes experienced in contemporary Western society. Finally, it is outlined a brief analysis  of cultural identities and diversities in the teleinformatics era.


2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 155-180
Author(s):  
Lisa Kienzl

Portrayals of mediumship in modern Western television narratives need to be seen as part of a broader phenomenon of the presence of religious elements in Western media, a phenomenon I argue expresses a longing for grand narratives in contemporary Western society. The portrayal and mediatization of religious elements in television narratives as well as their discussion in digital fan culture are part of what I would call a transformation process of knowledge and in particular knowledge of religious phenomena. More specifically, digital fan culture allows for an engagement with discursive transformation processes of knowledge and thus influences what is perceived as knowledge in society. Therefore, religious studies needs to pay closer attention to television narratives and the way fans interact with these narratives to create knowledge about religious practices. This article focuses on how the elements of “possession” and “mediumship” are being transformed by the US American TV series Supernatural and its fan culture. I argue that we can see at least two transformation processes here: the transformation and transplantation of religious concepts and practices (in the case of this article the idea of the human body as spirit medium) into a television context, and the transformation of these concepts and practices through digital fan culture. In its discussion of fan culture, the article looks at and analyzes fan based websites and how they present, discuss and imagine the body-medium.


Retos ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 516-524
Author(s):  
Lorena Velasco Santos ◽  
José Luis Pastor Pradillo ◽  
David Blanco Alcántara ◽  
Alfredo Jiménez Eguizábal

 La literatura científica viene insistiendo en los últimos años en una nueva valorización del cuerpo que el presente artículo trata de estudiar empíricamente. El instrumento de medida es el test elaborado por Casares y Collados (1998) que clasifica en 10 los valores del cuerpo y se ha aplicado a una muestra de 536 estudiantes de 1º de Bachillerato en Castilla y León en el curso escolar 2017/18. Se llevan a cabo dos procedimientos diferenciados en la obtención de resultados, por palabras y por valores del cuerpo. Asimismo, en cada uno de estos procedimientos se analiza tanto las frecuencias máximas como los valores medios, derivando finalmente en tres vías diferentes. Las puntuaciones obtenidas según las tres metodologías presentan características distintas y no susceptibles de comparativa dada la heterogeneidad en las unidades de medida, mientras sus jerarquías derivadas sí permiten comparación al respecto. Se estudian las tendencias más generalizadas que vinculan a los estudiantes con la sociedad occidental contemporánea y el cuerpo postmoderno. Los resultados muestran el valor placer como el más agradable y el religioso como el menos. Asimismo, los valores del cuerpo biológico, estético, intelectual y afectivo-social son destacados como los más agradables después del placer, mientras los valores ecológico, ético y dinámico son destacados como menos agradables. Todo ello apoya en general la perspectiva descrita por la literatura sobre el cuerpo postmoderno y su gran valoración como estructura orgánica en detrimento de su función humana, repercutiendo en campos diversos que demandan una intervención.  Abstract. The scientific literature has been insisting in recent years on a new valorization of the body that this article tries to study empirically. The instrument of measurement is the test devised by Casares and Collados (1998), which divides body values into 10 categories and it has been applied to a sample of 536 students from 1st year of Bachillerato in Castilla y León region of Spain during the academic year 2017/18. Two different procedures are performed to obtain results, by words and by body values. Also, in each of these procedures, both the maximum frequencies and the mean values are analyzed, eventually resulting in three different routes. The results obtained from the three methodologies show different characteristics and are not susceptible of comparative due to the heterogeneity in the units of measurement, however, the hierarchies derived from them do allow comparison in this regard. The most common trends linking students with contemporary Western society and post-modern body are examined. The results show pleasure value as the most fulfilling and religion as the least. Likewise, the biological, aesthetic, intellectual and affective-social body values are highlighted as the most pleasing after pleasure value, while the ecological, ethical and dynamic values are highlighted as less pleasant. All this, generally speaking, supports the perspective described by the literature about the postmodern body and its great value as an organic structure to the detriment of its human function, impacting on various fields that require intervention.


2021 ◽  
pp. 017084062199450
Author(s):  
Lauren McCarthy ◽  
Sarah Glozer

Emotional energy is key to disruptive institutional work, but we still know little about what it is, and importantly, how it is refuelled. This empirical paper presents an in-depth case study of ‘No More Page 3’ (#NMP3), an Internet-based feminist organization which fought for the removal of sexualized images of women from a UK newspaper. Facing online misogyny, actors engage in ‘emotional energy replenishment’ to sustain this disruptive institutional work amid emotional highs and lows. We introduce ‘affective embodiment’ – the corporeal and emotional experiences of the institution – as providing emotional energy in relation to disruptive institutional work. Affective embodiment is surfaced through alignment or misalignment with others’ embodied experiences, and this mediates how actors replenish emotional energy. Alignment with others’ embodied experiences, often connected to online abuse, means emotional energy is replenished through ‘affective solidarity’ (movement towards the collective). Misalignment, surfaced through tensions within the movement, means actors seek replenishment through ‘sensory retreat’ (movement away from the collective). This study contributes to theorization on institutional work and emotional energy by recentring the importance of the body alongside emotions, as well as offering important lessons for online organizing.


2018 ◽  
Vol 132 (2) ◽  
pp. 295-312 ◽  
Author(s):  
Redin A. Spann ◽  
William J. Lawson ◽  
Gene L. Bidwell ◽  
C. Austin Zamarripa ◽  
Rodrigo O. Maranon ◽  
...  

Bariatric surgery is increasingly employed to improve fertility and reduce obesity-related co-morbidities in obese women. Surgical weight loss not only improves the chance of conception but reduces the risk of pregnancy complications including pre-eclampsia, gestational diabetes, and macrosomia. However, bariatric procedures increase the incidence of intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR), fetal demise, thromboembolism, and other gestational disorders. Using our rodent model of vertical sleeve gastrectomy (VSG), we tested the hypothesis that VSG in diet-induced, obese dams would cause immune and placental structural abnormalities that may be responsible for fetal demise during pregnancy. VSG dams studied on gestational day (G) 19 had reduced circulating T-cell (CD3+ and CD8+) populations compared with lean or obese controls. Further, local interleukin (IL) 1β and IL 1 receptor antagonist (il1rn) cmRNA were increased in placenta of VSG dams. Placental barrier function was also affected, with increased transplacental permeability to small molecules, increased matrix metalloproteinase 9 expression, and increased apoptosis in VSG. Furthermore, we identified increased placental mTOR signaling that may contribute to preserving the body weight of the fetuses during gestation. These changes occurred in the absence of a macronutrient deficit or gestational hypertension in the VSG dams. In summary, previous VSG in dams may contribute to fetal demise by affecting maternal immune system activity and compromise placental integrity.


Labyrinth ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 91-105
Author(s):  
Gianluca Chiadini

The reception of the notions of trace, arkhé, and document in the work of Alain Nadaud This paper intends to point out the philosophical features in the novels of the French writer Alain Nadaud and their links with the philosophical theory concerning the concepts of trace, arkhé and document elaborated by Jacques Derrida in the second half of the XX century. This subject, related to the contemporary socio-historical concept of post-truth, reveals the originality and the up-to-date tendency in the novels of Alain Nadaud. This paper uncovers new important aspects of his work by proposing a solid philosophical interpretation of its main theoretical principles. In particular, it uncovers the philosophical reasons at the origin of his writing, which is based on the historical research method. Furthermore, it reveals the sense of dystopia of his novels and relates it with the most recent socio-philosophical analysis of contemporary western society.


2016 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karsten Senkbeil ◽  
Nicola Hoppe

This paper applies cognitive linguistic approaches, particularly conceptual metaphor theory, to the study of literature, and analyses how Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia (1998) by Marya Hornbacher communicates embodied experiences such as sickness, hunger, and (self-)loathing with the help of conceptual metaphors. It explores how the author renegotiates and partly recontextualizes highly conventionalized metaphors around eating disorders, mental illness, and identity to create new meaning, and how this strategy helped explain the mindset of a person with anorexia and bulimia to a broad critical readership in the late 1990s. This paper hence hypothesizes that the book’s emphasis on metaphors as a means to articulate bodily experiences surrounding a mental disorder may hint towards larger trends concerning the representation of the body–mind relationship in literature and culture in the last two decades.


2014 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 267-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mike Brown ◽  
Dawn Penney

This article draws on material associated with a solo sailing circumnavigation, undertaken by 16 year old Jessica Watson in 2009–2010, to discuss how her voyage provided a focal point for debates relating to voluntary risk-taking conducted within the sport and leisure context. Specifically, we illustrate how public and media commentaries on her voyage reflect discourses of risk being infused and conflated with discourses of responsibility, youth and gender. Our analysis brings to the fore the contested, moral and political nature of risk discourses in contemporary western society. Public reaction to Watson’s voyage indicates that descriptions of western society as risk-averse fail to capture the situated and dynamic perceptions of risk.


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