The Weight Of Womanhood

The Weight of Womanhood highlights the incomprehensible avoidable pressures put on women by societal expectations, male folks and sometimes women themselves. There is this culture of taking women for granted or taking advantage of women. Laban used his two daughters to swindle his nephew, Jacob, the Philistine Kings, and high officials used Delilah against Israelite leader, Samson who had become a pain in the ass for the Philistines’ leadership. King Saul attempted to use his daughters rather than any of his sons to kill David. Certain cultures imply that one of the worst things a woman can do is to conceive and bear a girlchild. They turn a blind eye to the murder of millions of growing girlchild in the womb on yearly basis. Moses’ older sister, Miriam resented and antagonized his wife to the extent that God was incensed to punish Miriam. King Rehoboam robbed his eldest son of his right because he preferred one of his stepmothers to the eldest son’s mother. When Samson’s mother claimed that an angel had visited her to talk about the imminent conception and birth of Samson, his father did not believe her. She had to ask God to resend His angel to attest to her claim before Samson’s father believed her. Most men take women’s gynecological and maternal exigencies for granted. Once Hannah did not conceive and bear him a child quickly, though he was supposed to love her very much, Elkanah opted for a second wife, Peninnah who made life miserable for Hannah once she bore Elkanah children while Hannah remained barren. He did not do anything to restrain Peninnah from worsening Hannah’s miseries.

Nearly four decades ago, Terence Ranger questioned to what extent African history was actually African, and whether methods and concerns derived from Western historiography were really sufficient tools for researching and narrating African history. Despite a blossoming and branching out of Africanist scholarship in the last twenty years, that question is still haunting. The most prestigious locations for production of African studies are outside Africa itself, and scholars still seek a solution to this paradox. They agree that the ideal solution would be a flowering of institutions of higher learning within Africa which would draw not only Africanist scholars, but also financial resources to the continent. While the focus of this volume is on historical knowledge, the effort to make African scholarship "more African" is fundamentally interdisciplinary. The essays in this volume employ several innovative methods in an effort to study Africa on its own terms. The book is divided into four parts. Part 1, "Africanizing African History," offers several diverse methods for bringing distinctly African modes of historical discourse to the foreground in academic historical research. Part 2, "African Creative Expression in Context," presents case studies of African art, literature, music, and poetry. It attempts to strip away the exotic or primitivist aura such topics often accumulate when presented in a foreign setting in order to illuminate the social, historical, and aesthetic contexts in which these works of art were originally produced. Part 3, "Writing about Colonialism," demonstrates that the study of imperialism in Africa remains a springboard for innovative work, which takes familiar ideas about Africa and considers them within new contexts. Part 4, "Scholars and Their Work," critically examines the process of African studies itself, including the roles of scholars in the production of knowledge about Africa. This timely and thoughtful volume will be of interest to African studies scholars and students who are concerned about the ways in which Africanist scholarship might become "more African." Toyin Falola, a leading historian of Nigeria and a distinguished Africanist, is the Frances Higginbothom Nalle Centennial Professor of History at the University of Texas at Austin. His numerous publications include Yoruba Historiography, African Historiography, and Nationalism and African Intellectuals. Christian Jennings is completing his Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin. He has contributed chapters on environmental history to the five-volume series on Africa published by Carolina Academic Press, and is co-editing a forthcoming book on historical methods.

Many people consider their weight to be a personal problem; when, then, does body weight become a social problem? Until recently, the major public concern was whether enough food was consistently available. As food systems began to provide ample and stable amounts of food, questions about food availability were replaced with concerns about "ideal" weights and appearance. These interests were aggregated into public concerns about defining people as "too fat" and "too thin." Social constructionist perspectives can contribute to the understanding of weight problems because they focus attention on how these problems are created, maintained, and promoted within various social environments. While there is much objectivist research concerning weight problems, few studies address the socially constructed aspects of fatness and thinness. This book however draws from and contributes to social constructionist perspectives. The chapters in this volume offer several perspectives that can be used to understand the way society deals with fatness and thinness. The contributors consider historical foundations, medical models, gendered dimensions, institutional components, and collective perspectives. These different perspectives illustrate the multifaceted nature of obesity and eating disorders, providing examples of how a variety of social groups construct weight as a social problem. Jeffery Sobal is Professor, Division of Nutritional Sciences, Cornell University. He is on the board of directors of the Association for the Study of Food and Society and he has Cornell University Graduate Field Membership in the areas of Nutrition, Development Sociology and Epidemiology. Donna Maurer is John S. Knight Postdoctoral Fellow in the Writing Program, Cornell University. She also serves on the board of directors of the Association for the Study of Food and Society and is an adjunct professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland University College. Drs. Sobal and Maurer are coeditors of a companion volume, Interpreting Weight: The Social Management of Fatness and Thinness, and Eating Agendas: Food and Nutrition as Social Problems

Examines the crucial role that coming-of-age narratives have played in American feminism.

As urban life and women's roles changed in the 19th century, so did attitudes towards physical health and womanhood. In this case study of health reform in Boston between 1830 and 1900, Martha H. Verbrugge examines three institutions that popularized physiology and exercise among middle-class women: The Ladies' Physiological Institute, Wellesley College, and the Boston Normal School of Gymnastics. Against the backdrop of a national debate about female duties and well-being, this book follows middle-class women as they learned about health and explored the relationship between fitness and femininity. Combining medical and social history, Verbrugge looks at the ordinary women who participated in health reform and analyzes the conflicting messages--both feminist and conservative--projected by the concept of "able-bodied womanhood."

Socialist women faced the often thorny dilemma of fitting their concern with women's rights into their commitment to socialism. Mari Jo Buhle examines women's efforts to agitate for suffrage, sexual and economic emancipation, and other issues and the political and intellectual conflicts that arose in response. In particular, she analyzes the clash between a nativist socialism influence by ideas of individual rights and the class-based socialism championed by German American immigrants. As she shows, the two sides diverged, often greatly, in their approaches and their definitions of women's emancipation. Their differing tactics and goals undermined unity and in time cost women their independence within the larger movement.

Literary and popular culture has often focused its attention on women readers, particularly since early Victorian times. In Reading Women, an esteemed group of new and established scholars provide a close study of the evolution of the woman reader by examining a wide range of nineteenth- and twentieth-century media, including Antebellum scientific treatises, Victorian paintings, and Oprah Winfrey's televised book club, as well as the writings of Charlotte Brontë, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Zora Neale Hurston. Attending especially to what, how, and why women read, Reading Women brings together a rich array of subjects that sheds light on the defining role the woman reader has played in the formation, not only of literary history, but of British and American culture. The contributors break new ground by focusing on the impact representations of women readers have had on understandings of literacy and certain reading practices, the development of books and print culture, and the categorization of texts into high and low cultural forms.

Millions of American women are perpetual dieters; many are stricken by devastating, sometimes fatal, eating disorders. Though diet and therapy books abound, few authors have tackled the complex sociocultural background that has influenced women and their view of themselves. Social historian and analyst of popular culture Roberta Pollack Seid presents this perspective, tracing and assessing the origins of weight consciousness up to our current mania. She discovers a dangerous link, dating to the early part of this century, between medical prescriptives and fashion prerogatives. A complex network of influences--from politics and the rise of feminism to insurance company demographics and changes in the food industry--have reinforced and propagated the tie between "fitness" and "thinness." Seid exposes our cherished axioms--"Thinner is healthier" and "Thinner is more beautiful"--As prejudices, not truths. Only by understanding this national obsession can women begin to free themselves from the terrible war it has made them unleash on their own bodies.--From publisher description.