Fatness and the Maternal Body Women's Experiences of Corporeality and the Shaping of Social Policy
Produktdetaljer
Biographical note
Maya Unnithan-Kumar is Reader in Social Anthropology at the University of Sussex. She is currently leading an Economic and Social Research Council (UK)–funded research project on state-NGO relations as defined by their engagement with human rights discourse in the fields of sexual, maternal and reproductive health in India.
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“…<em>a timely addition to the growing canon of obesity scholarship within anthropology…While any anthropological examination of body weight is likely to incorporate the themes of sex/gender and kinship, tackling these issues head-on makes this collection especially valuable…an impressive collection of different perspectives on, and stories about, obesity and fatness.</em>” <strong>· </strong><strong>Medische Antropologie</strong></p>
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“<em>The newest edition (Volume 22) to Berghahn Books outstanding 'Fertility, Reproduction and Sexuality' series, is a 248-page compendium that has been knowledgeably compiled and deftly edited…Informed and informative, [this volume] is a seminal collection of impressively presented scholarship and a highly recommended addition to personal, professional, and academic library reference collections and supplemental reading lists.</em>” <strong>· Library Bookwatch</strong></p>
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“<em>As a volume, this book weaves together many concerns and debates…[It] makes a valuable and fresh contribution to scholarship across a variety of fields and is accessible. The introduction would be particularly suitable as a concise overview to third year undergraduate and MSc students from a wide variety of disciplines. Overall the book would make a strong addition to both undergraduate and postgraduate reading lists.</em>” <strong>· </strong><strong>Sociology of Health & Illness</strong></p>
Obesity is a rising global health problem. On the one hand a clearly defined medical condition, it is at the same time a corporeal state embedded in the social and cultural perception of fatness, body shape and size. Focusing specifically on the maternal body, contributors to the volume examine how the language and notions of obesity connect with, or stand apart from, wider societal values and moralities to do with the body, fatness, reproduction and what is considered ‘natural’. A focus on fatness in the context of human reproduction and motherhood offers instructive insights into the global circulation and authority of biomedical facts on fatness (as ‘risky’ anti-fit, for example). As with other social and cultural studies critical of health policy discourse, this volume challenges the spontaneous connection being made in scientific and popular understanding between fatness and ill health.
List of Figures
List of Tables
Preface
Chapter 1. Introduction: Corporeality and Reproduction: Understanding Fatness through the Diverse Experiences of Motherhood, Consumption and Social Regulation
Maya Unnithan-Kumar
Chapter 2. The Traffic in ‘Nature’: Maternal Bodies and Obesity
Megan Warin, Vivienne Moore and Michael Davies
Chapter 3. Fat and Fertility, Mobility and Slaves: Long-term Perspectives on Tuareg Obesity and Reproduction
Sara Randall
Chapter 4. Women of Great Weight: Fatness, Reproduction and Gender Dynamics in Tuareg Society
Saskia Walentowitz
Chapter 5. Childbearing, Breast-feeding and Body Weight in Tanzania: Three Bodies, Three Individuals, Many Different Interrelations among the Wagogo (Central Tanzania)
Mara Mabilia
Chapter 6. The ‘Obesity Cycle’: The Impact of Maternal Obesity on the Exogenous and Endogenous Causes of Obesity in Offspring in the United Kingdom
Nicola Heslehurst
Chapter 7. Culture, Diet and the Maternal Body: Ghanaian Women’s Perspectives on Food, Fat and Childbearing
Ama de-Graft Aikins
Chapter 8. Unhealthy, Unwealthy, Unwise: Social Policy and Nutritional Education in a Disadvantaged Community in Ireland
Shauna Clarke
Chapter 9. The Maharaja Mac: Changing Dietary Patterns in India
Devi Sridhar
Chapter 10. Is there a Relation between Fatness and Reproductive Health? A Study on Body Mass Index and Reproductive Health of Indian Women
Aravinda Meera Guntupalli
Chapter 11. Reproducing Inequalities: Theories and Ethics in Dietetics
Lucy Aphramor and Jacqui Gingras
Notes on Contributors
Index
Produktdetaljer
Biographical note
Maya Unnithan-Kumar is Reader in Social Anthropology at the University of Sussex. She is currently leading an Economic and Social Research Council (UK)–funded research project on state-NGO relations as defined by their engagement with human rights discourse in the fields of sexual, maternal and reproductive health in India.