Download or read book Men and the War on Obesity written by Lee F. Monaghan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2008-04-02 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is obesity really a public health problem and what does the construction of obesity as a health problem mean for men? According to official statistics, the majority of men in nations such as England and the USA are overweight or obese. Public health officials, researchers, governments and various agencies are alarmed and have issued dire warnings about a global ‘obesity epidemic’. This perceived threat to public health seemingly legitimates declarations of war against what one US Surgeon General called ‘the terror within’. Yet, little is known about weight-related issues among everyday men in this context of symbolic or communicated violence. Men and the War on Obesity is an original, timely and controversial study. Using observations from a mixed-sex slimming club, interviews with men whom medicine might label overweight or obese and other sources, this study urges a rethink of weight or fat as a public health issue and sometimes private trouble. Recognizing the sociological wisdom that things are not as they seem, it challenges obesity warmongering and the many battles it mandates or incites. This important book could therefore help to change current thinking and practices not only in relation to men but also women and children who are defined as overweight, obese or too fat. It will be of interest to students and researchers of gender and the body within sociology, gender studies and cultural studies as well as public health researchers, policymakers and practitioners.
Download or read book Men and the War on Obesity written by Lee F. Monaghan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2008-04-02 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lee F. Monaghan offers a timely, critical and original take on the obesity debate, bringing male bodies into the frame and questioning the claim from public health that millions of people are unhealthy because they are ‘overweight’ or ‘obese’.
Download or read book Fat Talk Nation written by Susan Greenhalgh and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2015-06-24 with total page 477 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent decades, America has been waging a veritable war on fat in which not just public health authorities, but every sector of society is engaged in constant "fat talk" aimed at educating, badgering, and ridiculing heavy people into shedding pounds. We hear a great deal about the dangers of fatness to the nation, but little about the dangers of today’s epidemic of fat talk to individuals and society at large. The human trauma caused by the war on fat is disturbing—and it is virtually unknown. How do those who do not fit the "ideal" body type feel being the object of abuse, discrimination, and even revulsion? How do people feel being told they are a burden on the healthcare system for having a BMI outside what is deemed—with little solid scientific evidence—"healthy"? How do young people, already prone to self-doubt about their bodies, withstand the daily assault on their body type and sense of self-worth? In Fat-Talk Nation, Susan Greenhalgh tells the story of today’s fight against excess pounds by giving young people, the campaign’s main target, an opportunity to speak about experiences that have long lain hidden in silence and shame.Featuring forty-five autobiographical narratives of personal struggles with diet, weight, "bad BMIs," and eating disorders, Fat-Talk Nation shows how the war on fat has produced a generation of young people who are obsessed with their bodies and whose most fundamental sense of self comes from their size. It reveals that regardless of their weight, many people feel miserable about their bodies, and almost no one is able to lose weight and keep it off. Greenhalgh argues that attempts to rescue America from obesity-induced national decline are damaging the bodily and emotional health of young people and disrupting families and intimate relationships.Fatness today is not primarily about health, Greenhalgh asserts; more fundamentally, it is about morality and political inclusion/exclusion or citizenship. To unpack the complexity of fat politics today, Greenhalgh introduces a cluster of terms—biocitizen, biomyth, biopedagogy, bioabuse, biocop, and fat personhood—and shows how they work together to produce such deep investments in the attainment of the thin, fit body. These concepts, which constitute a theory of the workings of our biocitizenship culture, offer powerful tools for understanding how obesity has come to remake who we are as a nation, and how we might work to reverse course for the next generation.
Download or read book The Fat Studies Reader written by Esther Rothblum and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2009-11-01 with total page 395 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2010 Distinguished Publication Award from the Association for Women in Psychology Winner of the 2010 Susan Koppelman Award for the Best Edited Volume in Women’s Studies from the Popular Culture Association A milestone anthology of fifty-three voices on the burgeoning scholarly movement—fat studies We have all seen the segments on television news shows: A fat person walking on the sidewalk, her face out of frame so she can't be identified, as some disconcerting findings about the "obesity epidemic" stalking the nation are read by a disembodied voice. And we have seen the movies—their obvious lack of large leading actors silently speaking volumes. From the government, health industry, diet industry, news media, and popular culture we hear that we should all be focused on our weight. But is this national obsession with weight and thinness good for us? Or is it just another form of prejudice—one with especially dire consequences for many already disenfranchised groups? For decades a growing cadre of scholars has been examining the role of body weight in society, critiquing the underlying assumptions, prejudices, and effects of how people perceive and relate to fatness. This burgeoning movement, known as fat studies, includes scholars from every field, as well as activists, artists, and intellectuals. The Fat Studies Reader is a milestone achievement, bringing together fifty-three diverse voices to explore a wide range of topics related to body weight. From the historical construction of fatness to public health policy, from job discrimination to social class disparities, from chick-lit to airline seats, this collection covers it all. Edited by two leaders in the field, The Fat Studies Reader is an invaluable resource that provides a historical overview of fat studies, an in-depth examination of the movement’s fundamental concerns, and an up-to-date look at its innovative research.
Download or read book Belly of the Beast written by Da'Shaun L. Harrison and published by North Atlantic Books. This book was released on 2021-08-10 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: **The 2022 Lammy Award Winner in Transgender Nonfiction** Exploring the intersections of Blackness, gender, fatness, health, and the violence of policing. To live in a body both fat and Black is to exist at the margins of a society that creates the conditions for anti-fatness as anti-Blackness. Hyper-policed by state and society, passed over for housing and jobs, and derided and misdiagnosed by medical professionals, fat Black people in the United States are subject to sociopolitically sanctioned discrimination, abuse, condescension, and trauma. Da’Shaun Harrison--a fat, Black, disabled, and nonbinary trans writer--offers an incisive, fresh, and precise exploration of anti-fatness as anti-Blackness, foregrounding the state-sanctioned murders of fat Black men and trans and nonbinary masculine people in historical analysis. Policing, disenfranchisement, and invisibilizing of fat Black men and trans and nonbinary masculine people are pervasive, insidious ways that anti-fat anti-Blackness shows up in everyday life. Fat people can be legally fired in 49 states for being fat; they’re more likely to be houseless. Fat people die at higher rates from misdiagnosis or nontreatment; fat women are more likely to be sexually assaulted. And at the intersections of fatness, Blackness, disability, and gender, these abuses are exacerbated. Taking on desirability politics, the limitations of gender, the connection between anti-fatness and carcerality, and the incongruity of “health” and “healthiness” for the Black fat, Harrison viscerally and vividly illustrates the myriad harms of anti-fat anti-Blackness. They offer strategies for dismantling denial, unlearning the cultural programming that tells us “fat is bad,” and destroying the world as we know it, so the Black fat can inhabit a place not built on their subjugation.
Download or read book Fat Land written by Greg Critser and published by HMH. This book was released on 2004-01-05 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “An in-depth, well-researched, and thoughtful exploration of the ‘fat boom’ in America.” —TheBoston Globe Low carb, high protein, raw foods . . . despite our seemingly endless obsession with fad diets, the startling truth is that six out of ten Americans are overweight or obese. In Fat Land, award-winning nutrition and health journalist Greg Critser examines the facts and societal factors behind the sensational headlines, taking on everything from supersize to Super Mario, high-fructose corn syrup to the high costs of physical education. With a sharp eye and even sharper tongue, Critser examines why pediatricians are now treating conditions rarely seen in children before; why type 2 diabetes is on the rise; the personal struggles of those with weight problems—especially among the poor—and how agribusiness has altered our waistlines. Praised by the New York Times as “absorbing” and by Newsday as “riveting,” this disarmingly funny, yet truly alarming, exposé stands as an important examination of one of the most pressing medical and social issues in the United States. “One scary book and a good companion to Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation.” —Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Download or read book Weight Management written by Institute of Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2003-12-01 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The primary purpose of fitness and body composition standards in the U.S. Armed Forces has always been to select individuals best suited to the physical demands of military service, based on the assumption that proper body weight and composition supports good health, physical fitness, and appropriate military appearance. The current epidemic of overweight and obesity in the United States affects the military services. The pool of available recruits is reduced because of failure to meet body composition standards for entry into the services and a high percentage of individuals exceeding military weight-for-height standards at the time of entry into the service leave the military before completing their term of enlistment. To aid in developing strategies for prevention and remediation of overweight in military personnel, the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command requested the Committee on Military Nutrition Research to review the scientific evidence for: factors that influence body weight, optimal components of a weight loss and weight maintenance program, and the role of gender, age, and ethnicity in weight management.
Download or read book Fat in the Fifties written by Nicolas Rasmussen and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2019-03-26 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A riveting history of the rise and fall of the obesity epidemic during 1950s and 1960s America. Metropolitan Life Insurance Company identified obesity as the leading cause of premature death in the United States in the 1930s, but it wasn't until 1951 that the public health and medical communities finally recognized it as "America's Number One Health Problem." The reason for MetLife's interest? They wanted their policyholders to live longer and continue paying their premiums. Early postwar America responded to the obesity emergency, but by the end of the 1960s, the crisis waned and official rates of true obesity were reduced— despite the fact that Americans were growing no thinner. What mid-century factors and forces established obesity as a politically meaningful and culturally resonant problem in the first place? And why did obesity fade from public—and medical—consciousness only a decade later? Based on archival records of health leaders as well as medical and popular literature, Fat in the Fifties is the first book to reconstruct the prewar origins, emergence, and surprising disappearance of obesity as a major public health problem. Author Nicolas Rasmussen explores the postwar shifts that drew attention to obesity, as well as the varied approaches to its treatment: from thyroid hormones to psychoanalysis and weight loss groups. Rasmussen argues that the US government was driven by the new Cold War and the fear of atomic annihilation to heightened anxieties about national fitness. Informed by the latest psychiatric thinking—which diagnosed obesity as the result of oral fixation, just like alcoholism—health professionals promoted a form of weight loss group therapy modeled on Alcoholics Anonymous. The intervention caught on like wildfire in 1950s suburbia. But the sense of crisis passed quickly, partly due to cultural changes associated with the later 1960s and partly due to scientific research, some of it sponsored by the sugar industry, emphasizing particular dietary fats, rather than calorie intake. Through this riveting history of the rise and fall of the obesity epidemic, readers gain an understanding of how the American public health system—ambitious, strong, and second-to-none at the end of the Second World War—was constrained a decade later to focus mainly on nagging individuals to change their lifestyle choices. Fat in the Fifties is required reading for public health practitioners and researchers, physicians, historians of medicine, and anyone concerned about weight and weight loss.
Download or read book Women and Dieting Culture written by Kandi M. Stinson and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Commercial weight loss organizations have come under attack from feminist scholars for perpetuating the very social values that cause women to obsess about their weight. In Women and Dieting Culture, sociologist Kandi Stinson asks how these values are transmitted and how the women who join such organizations actually think about their bodies and weight loss. As part of her research, Stinson fully participated in a national, commercial weight-loss organization as a paying member. Her acute analysis and sensitive insider's portrayal vividly illustrate the central roles dieting and body image play in women's lives.
Download or read book Body Composition and Physical Performance written by Institute of Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 1992-02-01 with total page 371 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book surveys the entire field of body composition as it relates to performance. It includes a clear definition of terminology and a discussion of the various methods for measuring body composition. The authored papers represent a state-of-the-art review of this controversial field and address questions such as: What is a better measure of body compositionâ€"body fat or lean body mass? Does being overweight for one's height really affect performance? The book also addresses the issue of physical appearance as it relates to body fatness and performance. It includes an in-depth discussion of many of the topics of interest to those involved in sports medicine and exercise physiology.
Download or read book The Metamorphoses of Fat written by Georges Vigarello and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tracing the link between changing attitudes toward body size and modern conceptions of class, society, and self.
Download or read book Diet and Health written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 1989-01-01 with total page 765 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Diet and Health examines the many complex issues concerning diet and its role in increasing or decreasing the risk of chronic disease. It proposes dietary recommendations for reducing the risk of the major diseases and causes of death today: atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases (including heart attack and stroke), cancer, high blood pressure, obesity, osteoporosis, diabetes mellitus, liver disease, and dental caries.
Download or read book What s Wrong with Fat written by Abigail Saguy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2013-01-31 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What's Wrong with Fat? examines the social implications of understanding fatness as a medical health risk, disease, and epidemic. Examining the ways in which debates over fatness have developed, Abigail Saguy argues that the obesity crisis literally makes us fat, intensifies negative body image, and justifies weight-based discrimination.
Download or read book Killer Fat written by Natalie Boero and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2012-09-12 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the past decade, obesity has emerged as a major public health concern in the United States and abroad. At the federal, state, and local level, policy makers have begun drafting a range of policies to fight a war against fat, including body-mass index (BMI) report cards, “snack taxes,” and laws to control how fast food companies market to children. As an epidemic, obesity threatens to weaken the health, economy, and might of the most powerful nation in the world. In Killer Fat, Natalie Boero examines how and why obesity emerged as a major public health concern and national obsession in recent years. Using primary sources and in-depth interviews, Boero enters the world of bariatric surgeries, Weight Watchers, and Overeaters Anonymous to show how common expectations of what bodies are supposed to look like help to determine what sorts of interventions and policies are considered urgent in containing this new kind of disease. Boero argues that obesity, like the traditional epidemics of biological contagion and mass death, now incites panic, a doomsday scenario that must be confronted in a struggle for social stability. The “war” on obesity, she concludes, is a form of social control. Killer Fat ultimately offers an alternate framing of the nation’s obesity problem based on the insights of the “Health at Every Size” movement.
Download or read book Body of Truth written by Harriet Brown and published by Da Capo Lifelong Books. This book was released on 2015-03-24 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A science journalist's provocative exploration of how biology, psychology, media, and culture come together to shape our ongoing obsession with our bodies, while also tackling the myths and realities of the "obesity epidemic."
Download or read book The Challenge of Obesity in the WHO European Region and the Strategies for Response written by World Health Organization. Regional Office for Europe and published by World Health Organization. This book was released on 2007 with total page 77 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a brief, clear and easily accessible way, this summary illustrates the dynamics of the obesity epidemic and its impact on public health throughout the WHO European Region, particularly in eastern countries. It describes how factors that increase the risk of obesity are shaped in different settings, such as the family, school, community and workplace. It makes both ethical and economic arguments for accelerating action against obesity, and analyses effective programs and policies in different government sectors, such as education, health, agriculture and trade, urban planning and transport. The summary also describes how to design policies and programs to prevent obesity and how to monitor progress, and calls for specific action by stakeholders: not only government sectors but also the private sector - including food manufacturers, advertisers and traders - and professional consumers' and international and intergovernmental organizations such as the European Union.
Download or read book Body Wars written by Margo Maine and published by Gurze Books. This book was released on 2013-10-18 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written for activists and educators, this cultural critique of female body image discusses the topic as it relates to sports, fashion, advertising, and propaganda, and offers practical strategies for those willing to fight unhealthy or unrealistic female images in society. Original. Tour.
