Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia

Posted on 19 July 2017 by Sabrina Strings

How the female body has been racialized for over two hundred yearsThere is an obesity epidemic in this country and poor black women are particularly stigmatized as diseased and a burden on the public health care system This is only the most recent incarnation of the fear of fat black women, which Sabrina Strings shows took root than two hundred years ago.Strings weaves together an eye opening historical narrative ranging from the Renaissance to the current moment, analyzing important works of art, newspaper and magazine articles, and scientific literature and medical journals where fat bodies were once praised showing that fat phobia, as it relates to black women, did not originate with medical findings, but with the Enlightenment era belief that fatness was evidence of savagery and racial inferiority.The author argues that the contemporary ideal of slenderness is, at its very core, racialized and racist Indeed, it was not until the early twentieth century, when racialized attitudes against fatness were already entrenched in the culture, that the medical establishment began its crusade against obesity An important and original work, Fearing the Black Body argues convincingly that fat phobia isn t about health at all, but rather a means of using the body to validate race, class, and gender prejudice. Read Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia – kino-fada.fr I received a DIGITAL Advance Reader Copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review From the publisher, as I do not repeat the contents or story of books in reviews, I let them do it as they do it better than I do .How the female body has been racialized for over two hundred yearsThere is an obesity epidemic in this country and poor black women are particularly stigmatized as diseased and a burden on the public health care system This is only the most recent incarnation o I received a DIGITAL Advance Reader Copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review From the publisher, as I do not repeat the contents or story of books in reviews, I let them do it as they do it better than I do .How the female body has been racialized for over two hundred yearsThere is an obesity epidemic in this country and poor black women are particularly stigmatized as diseased and a burden on the public health care system This is only the most recent incarnation of the fear of fat black women, which Sabrina Strings shows took rootthan two hundred years ago.Strings weaves together an eye opening historical narrative ranging from the Renaissance to the current moment, analyzi...I received an ARC of this book through Netgalley in exchange of an honest review.This book was a thoroughly research account of how fatphobia or fatmisia arose from the othering of African bodies It s so well written an...A must read especially in our present time When will we stop seeing the black body as something to be feared but one to be uplifted This book is one that I will recommend for my book club.Fearing the Black Body The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia by Sabrina Strings is an in depth exploration of the female body and how it has been racialized stigmatized for over 200 years This book gives several accounts of how the body type and size of black women has been marveled at, studied, examined, and ultimately policed by others As of late, black women of a certain size have been demonized as a strain on our country s medical resources Fearing the Black Body provides so much research Fearing the Black Body The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia by Sabrina Strings is an in depth exploration of the female body and how it has been racialized stigmatized for over 200 years This book gives several accounts of how the body type and size of black women has been marveled at, studied, examined, and ultimately policed by others As of late, black women of a certain size have been demonized as a strain on our country s medical resources Fearing the Black Body provides so much research that proves this criticism of black wome...Excellent academic look at the ways that racist ideas of what constitutes a beautiful body have been ingrained in the fiber of the wellness industry This is a much needed addition to the conversation on justice and racism in this...This is an outstanding examination about fatphobia body size, especially in regard to black women The author uses primary sources from the history of the United States to draw attention to the ways in which fat women, and fat black women in particular, were and are thought of by white society Engaging with class, the medical establishment, religion, and education, Strings deftly identifies patterns of thought in America that gave rise to anti fat stigma and the fear of the fat black woman I r This is an outstanding examination about fatphobia body size, especially in regard to black...This nonfiction work has several goals at once First, to outline the history of the ideal woman from somewhere in the European middle ages into the present Second, to connect the introduction of slavery and black slaves to the turn toward idealization of the thin and white woman Finally, it uses a few leading critical theories to postulate that the changing tides support the degradation of black women and a source of controlling white women Strings also notes the complicity of the medi This nonfiction work has several goals at onc... Fearing the Black Body by Sabrina Strings is a free NetGalley ebook that I read in early May.Racial stereotypes held by white people and those with European ancestry toward the appearance o black men women i.e Hottentot Venus, BBWs, savagery, hypersexualization as well as the changes that take place globally over time in how we view being thin being desirable and athletic or undesirable and starving versus large healthy, durable, and strong or gluttonous, greedy, and unattractive , w Fearing the Black Body by Sabrina Strings is a free NetGalley ebook that I read in early May.Racial stereotypes held by white people and those with European ...This book was excellent, and very factual It took me longer than I had estimated to finish it, because I have never encountered a non fiction book that is so exactly correct in its historical context Strings does an excellent job of assuring reade...This book documents the connection between fatphobia and white supremacy Originally a means of controlling the bodies of white women as a part of eugenics, weight control went from medical concern over thinness to overt association between curvy bodies or bodies withbody fat and African people Thinness went from a shameful sign that american upperclass white women were underfed and not robust enough to a new symbol of anglo racial superiority...

Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia

19 July 2017

Sabrina Strings