Fat Studies: Mapping the Field

Fat Studies: Mapping the Field

Charlotte Cooper*University of Limerick

Abstract

An extensive body of literature concerning obesity already exists, but this paper seeks to map thefield of an emerging body of work that is critical of that dominant discourse. Although it has beenmost recently mobilised by the rhetoric of an assumed global obesity epidemic, or moral panicaround fatness, Fat Studies has an extensive history and interdisciplinary literature which questionsand problematises traditional understandings of obesity and draws upon the language, culture andtheory of civil rights, social justice and social change. Fat Studies enables the reframing of theproblem of obesity, where it is not the fat body that is at issue, but the cultural production offatphobia. Given the powerful commercial, ideological and institutional interest in maintainingdominant obesity discourse, such reframing is contested. Nevertheless, this paper demonstratesthat Fat Studies offers dynamic new possibilities for social scientists interested in using fat as aninterrogative lens.

This paper maps Fat Studies, an emerging interdisciplinary academic field, which is ripefor sociological exploration. Fat Studies is complex, features multiple actors and perspec-tives, has potential for exciting theoretical and empirical research, combines popular andhigh academic discourse with social justice concerns and is beginning to articulate an areaof human life where there is a hunger, pun intended, for clarity and understanding.

In this paper I consider some of the key themes and texts within Fat Studies as a means ofintroducing the field to those unfamiliar with it. My goal here is to show that there is muchmore to fat than the reductive miserliness of dominant obesity discourse and contemporaryobesity epidemic, and that work which considers fatness can be original and life-affirming.It is my aim that, as the paper progresses, readers will become aware of the richness withinFat Studies discourse, and be inspired to take on some of the work of expanding this field.

So let us begin by acknowledging that there is already a vast literature available onobesity which defines fatness as a pathological medical, psychological and social phenome-non. Under the mantra of treatment and prevention, fatness is a problem that requires asolution, that is, the physical reduction of the fat body, and the elimination of the poten-tial for individuals to become fat. Here fat is a fact, a body mass index (BMI) of 25 orabove indicates overweight and obese.

Some of the writers mentioned below support that idea of fatness as pathology, yet cri-tique various aspects – for example policy, medical evidence – which position it thus. Oth-ers regard the fixing of fat bodies as a dangerous and irrelevant goal, they argue that fatnessis part of human experience and should be explored without the overriding judgement thatit should be eliminated. An activist view would be that fat bodies have social value.

Therefore, Fat Studies is different to dominant obesity discourse in that it is critical; itseeks to expand the understanding of fatness beyond the narrow confines of medicalisa-tion or pathology, which is why the term ‘obese’ is frequently censured; it often incorpo-rates a social model which shifts the focus of interrogation away from the fat body itself

Sociology Compass 4/12 (2010): 1020–1034, 10.1111/j.1751-9020.2010.00336.x

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and more towards positioning and contingent systems and structures; and it provides aplatform for identifying, building and developing fat culture as well as extending alliancesbetween activism and the academy.

Fat Studies offers a complex definition of fat; the alarmist BMI is largely rejected as ameans of mapping bodies because it fails to address human diversity (Campos 2005; Har-ding 2007), and concrete definitions of fat create in-group and out-group skirmishing(Schoenfielder and Wieser 1983). Instead, fat is a fluid subject position relative to socialnorms, it relates to shared experience, is ambiguous, has roots in identity politics and isthus generally self-defined.

I have personal, political, professional and scholarly involvements with fat. As such, itsboundaries and intersections are informed by my two decades of fat activism within asocial movement that is called size acceptance, fat acceptance, fat liberation, fat politicsand by other names; it is also influenced by my personal history as a fat queer andthrough my budding identity as a scholar. As an activist, for example, I see that criticalexplorations of fatness as a social position and embodied identity have at least a 40-yearhistory (Cooper 2009) but it is only within recent years that academics have taken a simi-larly probing view of dominant obesity discourse. Events such as the annual Popular Cul-ture Association conference series in the US, which hosts a Fat Studies strand, or 1-dayseminars such as Fat Studies UK, which took place in York in 2008, have begun to shapethe field and are supporting an accompanying literature (Solovay and Rothblum 2009;Tomrley and Kaloski Naylor 2009). However, as I shall demonstrate here, fat activismand its related critical literature already provides Fat Studies scholars with a considerableamount of material for examination, this body of work offers more than just a radicalcounterpoint to dominant obesity discourse, it can also be seen as a culture, one that isbeginning to develop its own critical discourse.

There are some limitations to this review. I have omitted material available within thehealth sciences to focus on published academic work within the social sciences. There isalso an emerging body of work within the humanities which is not reflected here, readersinterested in this field are encouraged to explore chapters in Rothblum and Solovay(2009) and Tomrley and Kaloski Naylor (2009). For reasons of space I have also ignoreda lengthy examination of Health at Every Size, a developing critical paradigm for under-standing fat and health. Similar reasons underpin my decision to exclude the network ofzines, online message-boards and blogs, where a significant amount of Fat Studies com-mentary currently operates, or the numerous populist magazines supportive of fat activismthat have come and gone over the years.

I would like to add some notes on language. I use the term Fat Studies because ofwhat I regard as its inherent critique of the medicalised concept obesity. As an activist Iam interested in the use and reclamation of the word fat, to expunge shame from theterm and reinforce its signification as a term of pride and identity, and I see Fat Studies asan umbrella for many perspectives, including critical theory. Fat Studies appears in thetitles of two readers (Rothblum and Solovay 2009; Tomrley and Kaloski Naylor 2009)and is the most common name for the field in the UK, US, Australia, Canada and Eur-ope, where a majority of the scholarship is taking place.

Sobal and Maurer (1999a,b) open their collections with comments about social con-structionism, and Murray (2008) repeatedly annotates fat and obese with inverted commasto emphasise their constructedness and contestability. I acknowledge the slippery andcontextual nature of these categories, support the queer strategy of self-definition forworking with subjective fat identities, and will assume that the reader is aware of suchessentialist linguistic critiques.

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ª 2010 The Author Sociology Compass 4/12 (2010): 1020–1034, 10.1111/j.1751-9020.2010.00336.xSociology Compass ª 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

The global obesity epidemic

A critical obesity literature stretches back four decades but significant scholarly interest indeveloping this body of work is much more recent and has only begun to emerge withinthe last five years. The emergence of an assumed global obesity epidemic has necessitatedsuch discourse. Where critical research into obesity had previously been the niche domainof activists and feminists, international government support of global obesity epidemicrhetoric led to much higher stakes in research, with considerable funding for anti-obesityprojects, which provided an indirect platform for those who sought to analyse thesedevelopments.

The fuzzy origins of what has come to be known as the global obesity epidemic canbe found within a series of documents published in the late 1990s, for example, Mooreet al. (1997), Wilding (1997) and Popkin and Doak (1998) which were crystallised by theWorld Health Organization (1998) and, in the UK, Butland et al.’s (2005) Foresightreport, as well as in popular books such as Schlosser (2001). These works, and many oth-ers like them, warned of an obesity epidemic, an obesity timebomb, which would inevi-tably deplete worldwide health, create a massive financial burden of care, and affectchildren in particular.

The treatment and prevention of obesity that operates within the rubric of this epide-miological literature has come under fierce attack by a number of critics through threekey debates.

Firstly, there is a call for a more measured approach to obesity science and a refutingof claims made about fat bodies within global obesity epidemiology, for example in Cam-pos (2005), Gard and Wright (2005), Oliver (2006), Basham et al. (2007), Campos et al.(2006). Pieterman (2007) groups the first four books together in his short literaturereview of the social construction of fat, and they are very similar in the ways they exam-ine the available medical literature on fat and health and debunk obesity science, byshowing that it is a product of a social context in which fat hatred is endemic and profit-able. The authors consider how the obesity epidemic fuels wider political concerns andsupports particular ideological perspectives and policies. Gard and Wright diverge withdiscussions about the influence of feminist discourses on slenderness and the body, forexample Orbach (1978), Bartky (1990) and Bordo (1993), which are themselves part of awider feminist discourse on beauty, patriarchy and the body, for example Chernin (1983)and Wolf (1990). Basham et al. (2007) propose medical treatment for the ‘severely obesecategory’ (p. 40) as well as a healthy living agenda that veers close to traditional anti-obesity interventions and this illustrates a contradiction within some of these texts: whilstthe authors are critical of the origins and effects of the global obesity epidemic, theymaintain their investment in the treatment and prevention of obesity.

Secondly, Oliver (2006) points out that the WHO report was drafted by the Interna-tional Obesity Task Force, a pressure group consisting of health professionals who arefinancially supported and who act in the interests of various commercial weight lossorganisations. This raises issues about the global obesity epidemic and consumerism. Hemakes the provocative assertion that the global obesity epidemic is a government-sanc-tioned marketing strategy for multinational weight loss corporations. One of thesub-strategies of this process is the incorporation of anti-fat moral discourse withinanti-obesity health promotion.

Thirdly, there is concern about how global obesity epidemic rhetoric supports a moraldiscourse around fatness. Herndon (2005) asserts that the metaphorical war on obesityproposed by supporters of the obesity epidemic paradigm projects anxieties about

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nationhood, race, class and economics onto individuals and is an example of a moralpanic, described succinctly by Saguy and Almeling (2005) as ‘fat panic’. Saguy and Almel-ing (2008) continue this theme and note how morality became a significant part of thepopular discourse on obesity through the processing of the original reports by the globalnews media.

Other authors have developed and situated their work within this critical discourse.Monaghan (2008) presents his ethnography of male dieters against the presumed epi-demic; similarly, Stearns (2002) and Gilman (2008) write within a historical and cross-cultural reading of the phenomenon, Swee Kian Tay (2003) locates her critical reading ofobesity in Singapore, and Murray (2007) exposes health professionals’ value-laden criticalgaze in interpreting obesity as pathological. Harjunen (2002) and Evans et al. (2008) con-sider the theoretical groundings of the obesity epidemic and the effects of its practicalapplication, via policy, on young people. Wright and Harwood (2008) extend this con-cern further across different countries under the theoretical concept of biopedagogy, relat-ing to the increased surveillance, regulation and self-policing of young people’s bodiesthrough socio-medical ‘knowledge’. Azzarito (2008) endorses this view and argues thatfatness has become a curriculum project in American schools.

The academic rigour supporting these studies is a recent development in the field, yetthis approach could also be contested. Gard (2008) has criticised Campos for substituting‘bad science’ with ‘good science’ without critiquing the use of science, and much of thediscourse relies on an uncritically positivist stance regarding truth and facts. Moreover,the trend for professional and scholarly remoteness from the subject matter echoes thedistance between the WHO report and Foresight, for example, and the fat subjects oftheir research. Although some of the authors above identify as fat, fat people themselvesare abstracted and largely absent from the discourse which often also fails to engage withthe broader historical Fat Studies literature and activism that I will come to later.

An oppositional literature

The works cited above locate themselves against a dominant obesity discourse whichconstructs fat in 21st century Western culture through a biomedical framework concern-ing categorisation, illness and pathology. Chang and Christakis (2002) reveal the subtlechanges in fat medicalisation over the 20th century and provide excellent examples of thisdiscourse. But the critical literature relating to the Global Obesity Epidemic is only afraction of the available work that adopts a critical stance against dominant obesity dis-course. There is a much older and broader literature that is often overlooked by criticalfat panic arrivistes.

The earliest works of this kind are located within activism, such as Louderback’s(1970) manifesto, and the subsequent research produced and published by the Fat Under-ground, now available in the Largesse Fat Liberation Archives (http://www.eskimo.com/~largesse/Archives/). But the better-known and more heavily referenced works of thisprior body of literature are those which share some of the characteristics of critical obesityepidemic research, namely positivism, science, treatment, rational modernity and mean-ing. Bruch (1957) illustrates this approach well. Her research is very much of its time, itis racist and colonialist, she regards fatness as evidence of dysfunctional psychology, andcalls for its treatment, yet she is dismissive of contemporary weight loss interventions.Bruch is hardly supportive of what later came to be known as fat liberation, her positionis startlingly similar to today’s anti-obesity proponents, but her critical and questioningtone is radical.

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Bruch’s legacy can be seen in Ernsberger and Haskew (1987), and later Kolata (2007),who attempt to unpack obesity science, or Tenzer (1989), Polivy and Herman (1983)and Oliver-Pyatt (2004), who propose a non-diet approach to fat health. Alternativeobesity treatment models are suggested by Brown and Rothblum (1990), who discuss thepossibilities for anti-oppressive practice, and Irving (2000), who describes such a sizeacceptance ⁄ eating disorder prevention schools programme. A more recent synthesis ofBruch’s clinical work and size acceptance can be found in Health at Every Size, a non-diet paradigm for fat and health supported by health professionals including Bacon(2008), for example, and Gingras (2009). Bruch’s questionable categorisation of fatness asan eating disorder underpins later feminist theory concerning slenderness and the meaningof fatness to normative-sized people, such as Chernin (1983), Seid (1989) and Mason-John (1996).

Within rigorous, scholarly, ‘objective’ accounts of fat, which take a critical and opposi-tional view of mainstream obesity discourse, there is a body of work concerned withstigma and discrimination. This is not surprising given Goffman’s (1963) sociologicallyinfluential work in the field, and also, I would argue, the desire of critical researchers toengage with and promote social justice. Goodman (1995) considers fat prejudice as partof ‘a wider caste system’ (p. 17), compares its dynamics and features, such as dehumanisa-tion, to anti-semitism, and demonstrates the systemic nature of discrimination. Myers andRothblum (2005) address structural anti-fat attitudes within psychology, and present therelationship between stigma, discrimination and psychological distress, and Solovay (2000)explores the legal frameworks and opportunities for fighting discrimination. Within thepositivist traditions, Allison et al. (1991) and Lewis et al. (1997) attempt to develop mea-surement tools for anti-fat attitudes; Hague and White (2005) present systems for address-ing anti-fat attitudes amongst teachers; Crosnoe et al. (2008) examine the genderedeffects of body size in social networks; and Swami et al. (2008) show that high levels ofstigma correlate with higher BMI. Brownell et al.’s (2005) collection on weight biashighlights the problematic nature of ‘impartial’ scholarly detachment in Fat Studies. Someof its authors are affiliated with the Rudd Center at Yale University which is both criticalof weight bias yet supportive of weight loss and unwilling to adopt HAES (Health AtEvery Size, a non-weight loss health paradigm), a position seen by some fat activists asparadoxical (Robison 2007).

Concern for social justice and recognition of the effects of fatphobia, the fear andhatred of fatness and fat people and discrimination lead towards the point where distinc-tions start to become apparent between researchers who are somewhat removed from theday-to-day experience of being fat and those who have a closer relationship to it.Although fat people are the subjects of the research I have described so far, they are oftenabstract presences within it, a nebulous blob of people sometimes known as ‘the obese’,which echoes contested approaches to fat people within more traditional medicalisedobesity discourses. Goodman (1995) describes obesity science’s reduction of fat embodi-ment as ‘a collection of measurements and body parts’ (p. 16), which could be a criticismnot only of dominant obesity discourse but also of its critics.

Not surprisingly, an equally abundant literature that takes an oppositional stance todominant obesity discourses concerns fat subjectivity and embodiment, that is, how fat-ness is experienced, and these works tend to have been produced by those with first-handexperience of the phenomenon, for example Jenkins and Farnham (1988), both of whomwere involved with the London Fat Women’s Group of the late 1980s. To Braziel andLeBesco (2001), and Shaw (2006), fat identity is transgressive; it makes a mockery ofcultural norms, which is why it is socially reviled. Yet other accounts reveal a more

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complicated contingent social construction of how we as fat people see ourselves. Mill-man’s (1980) accounts and photographs, for example, explore vulnerability and ambiva-lence, as does Schmidt’s (1985) account of becoming disabled as a result of weight losssurgery, Murray’s (2005) struggles in identifying with fat politics or the internalisedoppression described by Calogero et al. (2009); that is, fat experience as bound up inissues of survivorhood and ambiguous or negative self-image.

Some social science scholars have incorporated these accounts into their researchthrough theory, for example Harjunen’s (2003) exploration of fat as a liminal state; Colls(2007) study of fat materialisation; fat as an embodiment of working class rhetoric inLeBesco (2007); or Levy-Navarro’s (2008) use of early modern literature to deconstructthe late-modern concept of obesity. Intersectionality is addressed by the Fireweed Collec-tive (1999) and Monaghan (2005) with accounts of third wave feminism and masculinity,respectively. A quartet of qualitative studies, Goode and Preissler’s (1983) exploration offat admirers as deviant; Gimlin’s (2002) encounters with NAAFA (National Associationto Advance Fat Acceptance); Swami and Tovee’s (2009) research into fat admirers’ per-ception of body size; and Scott-Dixon’s (2008) ethnography of fat women in sport, sug-gest that fat subjectivity is a phenomenon that can illuminate the embodiment of peopleof all sizes.

Another body of literature that spans scholarly and popular work around subjectivityconcerns how behaviours associated with fatness are experienced, namely weight loss.The accounts of Cannon and Einzig (1985), Ogden (1992) and Evans Young (1995) arenot necessarily critical of dominant obesity discourse, yet their problematising of diet andthe body is relevant to fat subjectivity and therefore to critical discourse within fat studies.Throsby (2007, 2008) is also concerned with fat people’s experience of weight loss,though she interrogates bariatric surgery; its conceptualisation as a re-birth and the per-sonal accounts drawn upon by fat people which avoid self-blame within the wider obes-ity-morality discourse. But weight loss is not the only behaviour associated with fatsubjectivity, Colls (2006), for example, charts the emotional experiences of fat womenshopping for clothes.

Fat subjectivity forms the basis of a rich profusion of popular works, which deserve aliterature review of their own. These books include memoirs by celebrities (Manheim2000; Mo’Nique and McGee 2004) and mortals (Bovey 2000; Klein 2008); size accep-tance children’s books (Jasper 1988; Newman 1991); self-help size acceptance books (Ber-nell and Renee 2000; Erdman 1996; Frater 2005; Gaesser 2002; Schroeder 1992; Thone1997); fashion, crafting and project work as a means of self-expression and self-care(Deckert 2002; Nanfeldt 1996; Soudan and French 1990) and non-diet health, fitness andwellness guides for fat people (Blank 2000; Harding and Kirby 2009; Jonas 1997; Lewis1986; Lyons and Burgard 1990; Roberts 1985; Shanker 2005; van der Ziel and Tourville2002).

Popular works about fat subjectivity segue fairly seamlessly into the literature of fat activ-ism in writings by Schoenfielder and Wieser (1983), Jenkins and Smith (1987), Lamm(1995), Bovey (1989), Cooper (1998) and Wann (1998) who combine personal testimonywith a critique of oppressive social structures. Empirical studies consider fat people’s rela-tionships to activism (Tischner and Malson 2008); use activism as a model through whichto explore people’s attitudes to activism (Sturmer et al. 2003); and have found improvedwell-being amongst fat women who adopted fat activism (McKinley 2004).

Finally, within the body of literature that seeks to provide an alternative set of valuesto dominant obesity discourses, there are a number of celebratory and appreciative worksaround fat, ranging from Klein’s (1996) meandering and pretentious love-letter to fat;

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photographic collections of fat nudes (Edison and Notkin 1994; Nimoy 2007); poetry(Barron et al. 2009; Donald 1986; Nichols 1984; Stinson 1993); novels (Koppelman2003; Stinson 1994, 1996, 2004); and fiction anthologies (Blank 2001; Jarrell and Sukrun-gruang 2003, 2005).

Reframing the problem

Oppositional literature which seeks to explore the very nature of fat subjectivity could beregarded as being part of a discourse that is trying to reframe the problem of obesity.Instead of thinking about fatness within a biomedical model, or as intrinsically tied to anenergy balance paradigm where fat is always assumed to be the result of a dysfunctionalbodily relationship between the number of calories consumed and the number of caloriesexpended, it proposes that there are multiple ways of looking at the issue or, indeed, thatthere are multiple issues.

This discourse includes works such as Neumark-Sztainer (1997), whose philosophicalreflections on obesity are medicalised, yet make a case for using a variety of perspectivesin conceptualising fatness. Dalton (1998), a dietician, calls for a similar multidisciplinaryapproach to weight management that considers size acceptance a valid intervention. Bothauthors persist in locating ‘the problem’ within fat embodiment, and therefore assumethat ‘the solution’ lies in treating and preventing fat bodies. But Cooper (1997) andHerndon (2002) suggest a different approach by introducing theoretical possibilities forreframing the discourse away from the body by considering the ways that structuralpower is enacted upon fat people, and invoking the Social Model of Disability as apotential theoretical basis for reconsidering fat activism and fat subjectivity. Sobal andMaurer’s (1999a,b) complimentary volumes also propose activism as a possible means ofreframing meanings associated with obesity, which LeBesco (2004) consolidates in herstudy, and Johnston and Taylor (2008) develop in their research. The latter two worksdemonstrate the limitations of traditional obesity discourse, and the expansive possibilitiesthat activism offers in challenging abjected fat identity and promoting a profound para-digm shift. Kirkland (2008) considers a central feature of this paradigm shift, that of thedemand for rights by fat activists and the promotion of a discourse that considers legalframeworks, discrimination and the potential for redress and social justice.

It would be a mistake to think that reframing fatness would be a process devoid of ten-sion. Saguy and Riley (2005) and Kwan (2009) present it as being hostile and politicallymotivated, a contest for supremacy between government, activists and industry. Thispower struggle is not surprising given the commercial interests involved in maintainingthe status quo. But there is tension within organisations too. Martin’s (2002) studyexplores how Weight Watchers, Overeaters Anonymous and NAAFA attempt to con-struct alignment and loyalty with organisational values, and frames of meanings withintheir membership, and the ways that users comply with and resist those processes.

Backlash

One of the stresses that comes from reframing fatness involves a jostling for primacybetween the various players within the newly expanded field, and perhaps an avoidanceof moral relativism. Dominant obesity discourse is comparatively monolithic compared tothis new landscape, which now demands answers to the question of where one allies one-self. Though traditional obesity discourses are undoubtedly problematic, alternativeaccounts are also attracting criticism and even backlash.

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A handful of writers are deeply uncomfortable with the notion of fat liberation, oreven fat acceptance. Fumento (1997) is critical of traditional obesity science, yet he issimilarly disdainful of fat liberation and supplies a number of weight loss strategies inhis book. Critser (2003) critiques the American food industry and is supportive of self-acceptance, yet he stresses that self-accepting fat people are deluded and weight loss isthe key to good health. Grossman (2003) articulates a popular view by asserting thatfat activism is insupportable because it undermines the possibility of individuals, andsociety in general, being able to overcome their obesity, although this position neglectsthe possible personal and social benefits that such activism can bring, improvedself-esteem or community-building, for example, or the health benefits of giving updieting.

Clearly these writers share a perspective that problematises fatness in the first place,unlike Bovey (1994, 2002), Murray (2005) and Glen (2008), who write from positionswithin the size acceptance movement. Whilst Bovey names a handful of fat women sheadmires for their fat embodiment, she is also alienated by and critical of a fat liberationmovement that she feels is dictatorial and advocates for other women who feel similarly.Personally unable to accept her own fatness, and sceptical of other fat women’s ability tofeel self-accepting of their bodies, Bovey changed the title of her book to reflect this posi-tion, lost weight in secret at a diet club and published a feminist weight loss book. Murrayis equally critical of what she feels is an inherent narrative within fat liberation, that onecomes out as fat and that there is no ambiguity or discomfort in the way that one mightexperience one’s fatness. This contradicts her subjective reality that includes episodes ofpride, disgust and shame. In a later work (2008) she critiques individualistic ideologywithin some parts of the fat acceptance movement and argues that people cannot choosetheir own realities, that everybody is implicated within social systems and that these impactupon the ways one experiences fat embodiment. Mack (2007) endorses this view in a cri-tique of the coming out discourse that is popular within fat liberation. Glen is also dismis-sive of the fat liberation movement, which she argues is hostile to those who suffer eatingdisorders.

Probyn’s (2008) criticisms of the size acceptance movement, which have beenwidely accepted within some areas of the academy, are reserved for what she considersits theoretical underpinnings. She is aghast by what she considers limited readings ofFoucault, although she does not reference Evans et al. (2008) or Wright and Harwood(2008), who both provide in-depth Foucauldian analysis of fatness. Probyn attacks poormedia literacy within fat liberation, but fails to address such phenomena as fat zine-making, or the Fatosphere (a network of fat bloggers), or the complex ways in whichfat activists have been using and creating media for the past 40 years. By stating thatfeminists are not engaging with fatness, Probyn echoes Wooley and Wooley’s (1979)influential argument that fat is a neglected feminist topic, and Smith’s (1989) call toradical feminists to create a politics of appearance. But Probyn’s own analysis is extre-mely limited, she seems unaware of the body of work I have outlined in this paperand has based her arguments on Orbach’s (1978) highly contested understanding offatness (Cooper 1998; Murray 2008; Tomrley 2009). Her critique is located withindiscourses around food poverty, energy balance, and she blames capitalism, agribusinessand ‘cheap and bad products’ (p. 402) for the preponderance of obesity. Not onlydoes she reinforce the feminist academy’s historical inability to develop a strong andrigorous understanding of fat, she merely reiterates the claims made by obesity epi-demic proponents using energy balance paradigms such as Foresight (Butland et al.2005).

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New complexities

Although flawed, Probyn’s account demonstrates the complexity of viewpoints and cri-tiques that are likely to surface as new literature emerges and Fat Studies matures; her dis-cussion cannot be reduced to positions of pro- or anti-. Is this work part of Fat Studies, oris it not? I hesitate to delineate between what is and what is not Fat Studies at this earlystage because the field is emergent and I wish to resist creating false polarisations. How-ever, as this review shows, there is already a critical edge to material that I consider FatStudies, which Probyn lacks here, and it is a field that supports a potential for expansivecritical engagement with fat that is not limited to obesity discourse, medicalisation or therhetoric of the war on obesity. Moreover, one of the strengths of Fat Studies is that it sup-ports the work of people who have direct experience of fat embodiment, grassroots activ-ists and other autonomous voices, it is not simply the product of remote expert curiosity.

Fat Studies currently makes use of a number of theoretical underpinnings which havegiven rise to as yet unexamined tensions arising from the differences between those theo-retical approaches. For example, in refuting the claims of the obesity epidemic, writerssuch as Campos (2005) draw upon positivist traditions. Yet Fat Studies also encompassesthe work of LeBesco (2004) and Murray (2008) who situate their work within poststruct-uralism. Could it be that having common political goals means that theoretical differencesdo not matter and that diverse works can coexist harmoniously within a field? Or perhapsthe field has yet to fragment along theoretical lines?

Walkerdine (2008) cites Gard (2008) as a further example of this growing complexity,stating that his work has been adopted by the libertarian right as well as leftist activistsbut is ignored within mainstream obesity discourses. She proposes that Arendt’s (1999)web of relations as a more fruitful model for illuminating the intricacies of the discoursesand goes on to say:

[…] traditional modes of opposition and critique, often directed at a government, for example,simply do not even vaguely match the complexity of the current political situation. […] there isno longer a simple politics of opposition, but complex oppositional politics with intersectingclaims, demands and interests. (Walkerdine 2008, 199)

This complexity is apparent within a handful of books (Rich, Monaghan and Aphramor2011; Solovay and Rothblum 2009; Tomrley and Kaloski Naylor 2009) which are moreexplicitly situated within Fat Studies than the earlier works mentioned in this review.Rothblum and Solovay divide their weighty Fat Studies Reader into subsections thataddress intersectionality, international perspectives, literature, history, popular culture,legal theory and civil rights, economics and political theory, education, science and publichealth and fat activism. The Pop Culture Association’s annual conference, which includesa strand that has been instrumental in developing Fat Studies, brings further additions:panels on Encountering and Coping with Anti-Fat Bias, fat embodiment and an examina-tion of visual representations of fatness. These works guard against moral relativism byacknowledging the body of critical literature, maintaining their own critical perspectiveand upholding a commitment to wider social justice issues.

Obviously, as an emerging location for scholarly investigation, there are substantial gapsin the literature, for example: although intersectionality is an interest, there are few criti-cal cross-cultural studies; a lack of empirical studies for HAES; little scholarship thatreflects abundance of popular literature and vice versa; virtually no theoretical or historicalexplanations for fat activism; and a distressing polarisation between those who wish topreserve dominant obesity discourses and those who wish to dismantle them.

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This literature review has shown that the works within Fat Studies cannot be writ-ten off as a recent phenomenon on a single-issue. Although the Fat Studies literatureis dominated by such works, it is more than merely a critique of current obesity epi-demic politicking, as contributions by cultural historians and anthropologists Schwarz(1986) and Kulick and Meneley (2005) demonstrate. I have also argued that althoughthe body of work has roots within an oppositional literature, and that its critical nat-ure is important, it is moving beyond that remit, as it must, to address new complexi-ties, for example in Longhurst (2005) attempts to develop research agendas withingeography that consider fatness; Guthman and DuPuis (2006), who critique obesityepidemic rhetoric from an energy balance model of fat, itself highly contested withinFat Studies; Ross and Moorti’s (2005) collection of Feminist Media Studies articles onfat; or Giusti’s forthcoming anthology that addresses fatness and queer theory. FatStudies offers new ways of exploring fat for sociologists, not least because it revealsthe limitations of current approaches to fat within the sociology of the body. Thesetend to rely on feminist analyses of eating disorders and dieting as proxies for fat, orthey reiterate dominant obesity discourse without critical interrogation (Crossley 2006;Turner 1996).

Given the commercial and governmental pressures to treat and prevent obesity withinthe alleged global obesity epidemic, it is likely that Fat Studies may become co-opted bysupporters of dominant obesity discourse, fat activists have already seen aspects of theircritiques subsumed by diet corporations for example, but I hope that Fat Studies canmorph into a canon that considers the value of fat diversity, fat culture, that can addressnew complexities, and create possibilities for recognising fat as a perspective, a new kindof interdisciplinary lens.

Acknowledgement

Thanks to Dr Lee Monaghan at the University of Limerick, and the anonymous review-ers, for their support of this paper.

Short Biography

Charlotte Cooper is currently an Irish Social Science Platform Government of IrelandPhD Scholar at the University of Limerick, undertaking research on fat activism. Char-lotte has worked as a journalist, web editor and psychotherapist. She makes zines andfilms, and continues to publish and be active in various DIY-culture scenes. Charlotteauthored the novel Cherry (2002, London: Red Hot Diva). Charlotte’s current researchinterests include fat activism, Fat Studies, counselling and psychotherapy, peace-building,the social effects of the 2012 Olympics, DIY cultures, censorship and disability theory.A version of her MA dissertation from the University of East London was published in1998 as Fat & Proud: The Politics of Size by the Women’s Press. She holds a BA (Hons) inDrama from the University College of Wales at Aberystwyth. Charlotte blogs at: http://www.obesitytimebomb.blogspot.com.

Selected recent publications

Cooper, C. (2010) ‘Fat Lib: How Activism Expands the Obesity Debate,’ in Expandingthe Obesity Debate, edited by L. Monaghan, L. Aphramor and E. Rich. London: Palgrave.

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Cooper, C. (2009) ‘Maybe they should Call it Fat American Studies,’ in The Fat Stud-ies Reader, edited by S. Solovay and E. Rothblum. New York: New York UniversityPress.

Cooper, C. (2009) ‘Fat Activism in Ten Astonishing, Beguiling, Inspiring and Beauti-ful Episodes,’ in Fat Studies in the UK, edited by C. Tomrley and A. Kaloski. York: RawNerve Books.

Note

* Correspondence address: Charlotte Cooper, Department of Sociology, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland.E-mail: [email protected]

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Documents

Fat Studies: Mapping the Field