Here is a place for you/know your place: Critiquing “biopedagogy” embedded in images of the female body in fitness advertising

Journal of Consumer Culture ◽

10.1177/1469540519876009 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 146954051987600 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Carly Drake ◽

Scott K. Radford

Keyword(s):

Public Goods ◽

Feminist Theory ◽

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Critical Reading ◽

Sport Culture ◽

Contemporary Media ◽

Endurance Runners ◽

The Ideal

The historically masculine realm of sport has not always been welcoming to women. Today, women have found a place in sport culture, but contemporary media position and address them as objects whose bodies are public goods available for interested parties to judge. In this critical reading of fitness advertisements targeting female recreational endurance runners, we combine poststructuralist feminist theory and a hermeneutic methodology to investigate if and how advertisements participate in this practice. Given the body’s salience at the intersection of sport, the marketplace, and media, we focus on how the body is depicted. We find that advertisements treat the body as a machine, prescribing and normalizing an obsession with athletics. They glorify the pursuit of the ideal running body through athletics and discount women’s potential in and contributions to sport. In this way, advertisements function as a “biopedagogy” that teaches consumers how a suitable body appears and functions.

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Embodying the culture of achievement: Culture between illness and perfection is a ‘thin line’ – obtaining the ideal female body as an act of achievement

Culture & Psychology ◽

10.1177/1354067x211004085 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1354067X2110040

Author(s):

Josefine Dilling ◽

Anders Petersen

Keyword(s):

Experimental Study ◽

Human Body ◽

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Thin Line ◽

Complex Processes ◽

The Individual ◽

Different Levels ◽

The Ideal ◽

Body Ideals

In this article, we argue that certain behaviour connected to the attempt to attain contemporary female body ideals in Denmark can be understood as an act of achievement and, thus, as an embodiment of the culture of achievement, as it is characterised in Præstationssamfundet, written by the Danish sociologist Anders Petersen (2016) Hans Reitzels Forlag . Arguing from cultural psychological and sociological standpoints, this article examines how the human body functions as a mediational tool in different ways from which the individual communicates both moral and aesthetic sociocultural ideals and values. Complex processes of embodiment, we argue, can be described with different levels of internalisation, externalisation and materialisation, where the body functions as a central mediator. Analysing the findings from a qualitative experimental study on contemporary body ideals carried out by the Danish psychologists Josefine Dilling and Maja Trillingsgaard, this article seeks to anchor such theoretical claims in central empirical findings. The main conclusions from the study are used to structure the article and build arguments on how expectations and ideals expressed in an achievement society become embodied.

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Cuerpo indeterminado: La precariedad del cuerpo en el discurso feminista

Revista de la Academia ◽

10.25074/0196318.0.47 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 20 ◽

pp. 47

Author(s):

María Isabel Peña Aguado

Keyword(s):

Feminist Theory ◽

Queer Theory ◽

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Philosophical Tradition ◽

Font Size ◽

Feminist Discourse ◽

Feminist Movements ◽

Cuerpo Femenino

La teoría feminista heredó de una tradición filosófica hostil la identificación de cuerpo y mujer. Partiendo de esta identificación de mujer y cuerpo es comprensible que un cuestionamiento del concepto ‘mujer’ influya asimismo en el lugar que va a encontrar el cuerpo dentro del movimiento y teoría feministas. Ese lugar será diferente dependiendo de las diversas reivindicaciones que marcan las diferencias entre los distintos feminismos y teorías queer. La pregunta que se plantea es hasta qué punto la precariedad del cuerpo femenino dentro de la misma teoría feminista es consecuencia del cuestionamiento del concepto de mujer o si, por el contrario, no será más bien el rechazo a una realidad corporal concreta lo que ha permitido y ayudado a desarmar los conceptos de ‘mujer’ y ‘mujeres’ hasta el punto de considerarlos como innecesario para el mismo discurso y políticas feministas contemporáneos.Palabras claves: cuerpo, mujeres, feminismo, Teoría Queer Indeterminacy of the body: precariousness of body in the feminist discourseFeminist theory inherited the identification of woman and body from a hostile philosophical tradition. Given this identification, it is understandable that a questioning of the concept ‚woman‘ also influences the place that the body will find in the feminist movements and theories. The question that arises is how far the precariousness of the female body within feminist theory itself is the result of a questioning of the concept of ‘woman’ or whether, on the contrary, it is the rejection of a concrete corporal reality which has enabled and helped to disarm the concepts of ‚woman‘ and ‚women‘ to the point of considering them unnecessary for contemporary feminist discourse and politics. Keywords: body, women, feminism, Queer Theory

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Re-touched

Fashion Style & Popular Culture ◽

10.1386/fspc_00079_1 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 8 (2-3) ◽

pp. 205-210

Author(s):

Sarah Eyre ◽

Xanthe Hutchinson

Keyword(s):

Feminist Theory ◽

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Power Structures ◽

Collaborative Project ◽

The Gaze ◽

Female Nude ◽

Opening Up

Re-touched is a collaborative project by collage artist Sarah Eyre and fashion photographer Xanthe Hutchinson. Both artists share an interest in the female body, particularly the notion of pleasure in display and gaze between women and the body. The body of work that forms Re-touched combines photographic and collage methods in order to embody a sense of sensuality through the opening up and enfolding of the female form, on set and through the process of collage. The artists position their work within a framework of feminist theory that questions the binary thinking around the gaze. They draw on the writing of Laura U. Marks to bring a haptic quality to their photographic and collage interventions to the image, and in inviting the viewer to be touched by their images. Through this series of photographic collages, they have established a visual and tactile approach that utilizes the body, is collaborative and re-figures the power structures between model, photographer and viewer. Their images offer a way of rethinking and reshaping representations of the female nude.

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Men’s Hunger, Food Consumption, and Preferences for Female Body Types

Social Psychology ◽

10.1027/1864-9335/a000210 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 45 (6) ◽

pp. 495-497 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Nicolas Guéguen

Keyword(s):

Food Consumption ◽

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Slender Body ◽

Mediation Effect ◽

Point Scale ◽

Body Type ◽

Experimental Conditions

Nelson and Morrison (2005 , study 3) reported that men who feel hungry preferred heavier women. The present study replicates these results by using real photographs of women and examines the mediation effect of hunger scores. Men were solicited while entering or leaving a restaurant and asked to report their hunger on a 10-point scale. Afterwards, they were presented with three photographs of a woman in a bikini: One with a slim body type, one with a slender body type, and one with a slightly chubby body. The participants were asked to indicate their preference. Results showed that the participants entering the restaurant preferred the chubby body type more while satiated men preferred the thinner or slender body types. It was also found that the relation between experimental conditions and the choices of the body type was mediated by men’s hunger scores.

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‘Good enough for a spot of lippy anyway’: Rape and the Body Politic in My Brother Tom

Journal of British Cinema and Television ◽

10.3366/jbctv.2013.0139 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 10 (2) ◽

pp. 358-373

Author(s):

Louise Wilks

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Female Body ◽

Body Politic ◽

The Body ◽

Sexual Violation ◽

Female Protagonist ◽

British Cinema ◽

Hollywood Movies ◽

Contemporary Cinema ◽

Rape Narratives

The representation of rape continues to be one of the most highly charged issues in contemporary cinema, and whilst many discussions of this topic focus on Hollywood movies, sexual violation is also a pervasive topic in British cinema. This article examines the portrayal of a female's rape in the British feature My Brother Tom (2001), a powerful and often troubling text in which the sexual violation of the teenage female protagonist functions as a catalyst for the events that comprise the plot, as is often the case in rape narratives. The article provides an overview of some of the key feminist academic discussions and debates that cinematic depictions of rape have prompted, before closely analysing My Brother Tom's rape scene in relation to such discourses. The article argues that the rape scene is neither explicit nor sensationalised, and that by having the camera focus on Jessica's bewildered reactions, it positions the audience with her, and powerfully but discreetly portrays the grave nature of sexual abuse. The article then moves on to examine the portrayal of sexual violation in My Brother Tom as a whole, considering the cultural inscriptions etched on the female body within its account of rape, before concluding with a discussion of the film's depiction of Jessica's ensuing methods of bodily self-inscription as she attempts to disassociate her body from its sexual violation.

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The role of the female body in contesting and negotiating space in sports for women in rural and urban Zimbabwe

African Journal of Religion, Philosophy and Culture ◽

10.31920/2634-7644/2020/1n2a6 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 1 (2) ◽

pp. 93-113

Author(s):

Obert Bernard Mlambo ◽

Keyword(s):

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

Gender Ideologies ◽

Victorian Culture ◽

Girl Child ◽

School Sports ◽

Rural And Urban ◽

Gender Ideals ◽

A Site ◽

Embodied Practice

This article examined attitudes, knowledge, behavior and practices of men and society on Gender bias in sports. The paper examined how the African female body was made into an object of contest between African patriarchy and the colonial system and also shows how the battle for the female body eventually extended into the sporting field. It also explored the postcolonial period and the effects on Zimbabwean society of the colonial ideals of the Victorian culture of morality. The study focused on school sports and the participation of the girl child in sports such as netball, volleyball and football. Reference was made to other sports but emphasis was given to where women were affected. It is in this case where reference to the senior women soccer team was made to provide a case study for purposes of illustration. Selected rural community and urban schools were served as case references for ethnographic accounts which provided the qualitative data used in the analysis. In terms of methodology and theoretical framework, the paper adopted the political economy of the female body as an analytical viewing point in order to examine the body of the girl child and of women in action on the sporting field in Zimbabwe. In this context, the female body is viewed as deeply contested and as a medium that functions as a site for the redirection, profusion and transvaluation of gender ideals. Using the concept of embodiment, involving demeanor, body shape and perceptions of the female body in its social context, the paper attempted to establish a connection between gender ideologies and embodied practice. The results of the study showed the prevalence of condescending attitudes towards girls and women participation in sports.

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BODY PRACTICES OF WOMEN IN THE LIGHT OF FEMINIST DEBATES

Philosophical Literary Journal Logos ◽

10.22394/0869-5377-2018-4-129-152 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 129-156 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Keyword(s):

Female Body ◽

Sense Of Self ◽

Social Institutions ◽

The Body ◽

Social Regulation ◽

Critical Study ◽

Phenomenological Tradition ◽

Academic Feminism ◽

Female Bodies ◽

Body Practices

The paper provides an analysis of the structuralist and phenomenological traditions in interpretation of female body practices. The structuralist intellectual tradition bases its methodology on concepts from social anthropology and philosophy that see the body as ‘ordered’ by social institutions. Structuralist approaches within academic feminism are focused on critical study of the social regulation of female bodies with respect to reproduction and sexualisation (health and beauty practices). The author focuses on the dominant physical ideal of femininity and the means for body pedagogics that have been constructed by patriarchal authority. In contrast to theories of the ordered body, the phenomenological tradition is focused on the “lived” body, embodied experience, and the personal motivation and values attached to body practices. This tradition has been influenced by a variety of schools of thought including philosophical anthropology, phenomenology and action theories in sociology. Within academic feminism, there are at least three phenomenologically oriented strategies of interpretation of female body practices. The first one is centred around women’s individual situation and bodily socialization; the second one studies interrelation between body practices and the sense of the self; and the third one postulates the potential of body practices to destabilize the dominant ideals of femininity and thus provides a theoretical basis for feminist activism. The phenomenological tradition primarily analyses the motivational, symbolic and value-based components of body practices as they interact with women’s corporeality and sense of self. In general, both structuralist and phenomenological traditions complement each other by focusing on different levels of analysis of female embodiment.

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Circadian tuning of motivation. A little organ of yesterday?

Acta Neuropsychiatrica ◽

10.1017/s0924270800037455 ◽

1995 ◽

Vol 7 (2) ◽

pp. 21-23 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

S. Daan

Keyword(s):

Internal State ◽

External Environment ◽

Animal Behaviour ◽

The Body ◽

Biological Clocks ◽

Motivational Systems ◽

Regulatory Principle ◽

The Face ◽

Temporal Organisation ◽

The Ideal

The analysis of motivational systems underlying temporal organisation in animal behaviour has relied primarily on two conceptual functional frameworks: Homeostasis and biological clocks. Homeostasis is one of the most general and influential concepts in physiology. Walter Cannon introduced homeostasis as a universal regulatory principle which animals employ to maintain constancy of their ‘internal milieu’ in the face of challenges and perturbations from the external environment. Cannon spoke of “The Wisdom of the Body”, the collective of responses designed to defend the ideal internal state against those perturbations.

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Feminist Theory

The Oxford Handbook of Virginia Woolf ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198811589.013.32 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 488-503

Author(s):

Jean Mills

Keyword(s):

Feminist Theory ◽

Political Thought ◽

Life Writing ◽

The Body ◽

Feminist Politics ◽

Feminist Thought ◽

Feminist Discourse ◽

Women's Lives ◽

Feminist Community ◽

Critical Responses

This chapter examines Virginia Woolf’s foundational role in the development of feminist theory, placing her theoretical positions on women’s lives and life-writing, privacy, the body, and self-expression in dialogue with a diverse and actively changing continuum of feminist thought. Focusing on the return of rage to the forefront of feminist discourse and social media’s effect upon feminist politics, the chapter chronicles the changing critical responses to Woolf’s feminisms, in relation to her positions on feminist identities and feminist community. The chapter also investigates the ways in which women of colour feminists disclosed Woolf’s racialized self and racist thinking to assess the place of Woolf’s feminism in contemporary political thought. From issues seeking to reconcile and value difference and diversity with the uses of ambivalence and calls for unity and integration, the chapter places the concepts and vocabulary of feminist theory within the context of Virginia Woolf’s work and example.

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French Women, Italian Art, and Other “Advocates of the Body” in Harriet Beecher Stowe's The Minister's Wooing

The New England Quarterly ◽

10.1162/tneq.2010.83.1.47 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 83 (1) ◽

pp. 47-72 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Dorothy Z. Baker

Keyword(s):

Female Body ◽

The Body ◽

The Novel ◽

Religious Paintings ◽

Italian Art

Displays of sanctified eroticism in The Minister's Wooing reveal Harriet Beecher Stowe's conviction that the body is inherently holy. The author's experience of religious paintings and her observation of French women in Europe deepened her belief that the female body is an instrument of spirituality, as can be traced in the novel.

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