Killer Fat

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.

In The Hyper(in)visible Fat Woman Gailey investigates the interface between fat women's perceptions of their bodies and of the social expectations and judgments placed on them. The book explores the phenomenon of 'hyper(in)visibility', the seemingly paradoxical social position of being paid exceptional attention while simultaneously being erased.

Most likely the fat that bothers you most is belly fat. Despite exercising and eating a diet low in Sugar Calories, you’re still stuck with that stubborn fat. So what’s the missing link? Breakthrough research has confirmed that combining the right diet with the right mind-set is the secret to eliminating the most stubborn of all fat – belly fat. Stress is the number one reason so many of are led to self-sabotage when trying to eat well, but following Jorge Cruise’s revolutionary Carb Control™ will curb your cravings and balance your hormones. Let Jorge guide you with daily planners full of easy, toss-together meals, and you can lose up to 11 lbs. in your first week alone!

Fat Kids: Truth and Consequences is an informational vault of deeply personal tales and essential information, focusing on the lives, questions, and concerns of parents and children living in a childhood obesity crisis. Unlike most books about weight, however, Fat Kids is not a dieting or weight loss how-to; it instead explores the true human experiences and often untold science outside the current political positioning on children and weight. This book powerfully combines interviews, relevant research, social anecdotes, personal author accounts, and the reality of children struggling with weight, to create a narrative that is profoundly poignant, accessible, and essential for understanding our current war on fat. Fat Kids is a truly unique work; all other books focusing on children and weight are solely focused only on diet and weight loss. This book, with its empathetic point of view, raw emotion, and solid information, is a necessary voice in the literary scene.

Traits that signal belonging dictate our daily routines, including how we eat, move, and connect to others. In recent years, "fat" has emerged as a shared anchor in defining who belongs and is valued versus who does not and is not. The stigma surrounding weight transcends many social, cultural, political, and economic divides. The concern over body image shapes not only how we see ourselves, but also how we talk, interact, and fit into our social networks, communities, and broader society. Fat in Four Cultures is a co-authored comparative ethnography that reveals the shared struggles and local distinctions of how people across the globe are coping with a bombardment of anti-fat messages. Highlighting important differences in how people experience "being fat," the cases in this book are based on fieldwork by five anthropologists working together simultaneously in four different sites across the globe: Japan, the United States, Paraguay, and Samoa. Through these cases, Fat in Four Cultures considers what insights can be gained through systematic, cross-cultural comparison. Written in an eye-opening and narrative-driven style, with clearly defined and consistently used key terms, this book effectively explores a series of fundamental questions about the present and future of fat and obesity.

The Contemporary Reader of Gender and Fat Studies is a key reference work in contemporary scholarship situated at the intersection between Gender and Fat Studies, charting the connections and tensions between these two fields. Comprising over 20 chapters from a range of diverse and international contributors, the Reader is structured around the following key themes: theorizing gender and fat; narrating gender and fat; historicizing gender and fat; institutions and public policy; health and medicine; popular culture and media; and resistance. It is an intersectional collection, highlighting the ways that "gender" and "fat" always exist in connection with multiple other structures, forms of oppression, and identities, including race, ethnicity, sexualities, age, nationalities, disabilities, religion, and class. The Contemporary Reader of Gender and Fat Studies is essential reading for scholars and advanced students in Gender Studies, Sexuality Studies, Sociology, Body Studies, Cultural Studies, Psychology, and Health. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.