Fat and the Body in the Long Nineteenth Century

Meanings, Measures, and Representations

AvAmy Shaw,Lynn Kennedy

E-bok

Engelska, 2024

636 kr

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Beskrivning

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the body was a key focus of discourse. Fat and the Body in the Long Nineteenth Century animates discussion and analyses of fatness, highlighting how corporeal expectations fit into larger social systems and showing how interpretations have shifted over time. This collection examines a host of primary sources – including literature, art, medical treatises, journalism, political cartoons, soldiers’ letters home, and popular fiction – to identify trends in how fat was perceived and promoted in the English-speaking world over the long nineteenth century.

Divided into four thematic sections, the book addresses epistemologies, artistic and literary representations, the turn towards quantification and measurement, and the connections to imperialism and colonialism. It explores the complex debate about the meaning of fat and its signalling of health, beauty, moral strength, and class status. The book shows how contemporary presentations and discussions of fat offer insights into ideals of gender and race and the processes of imperialism and of professionalization in the social sciences and medicine. By tracing how debates shifted over time, the book ultimately reveals that there was no universal interpretation of fat as a positive or negative characteristic throughout the nineteenth century.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum:2024-12-16
Språk:Engelska
Antal sidor:288
Filformat:EPUB
Kopieringsskydd:LCP
ISBN:9781487553401
Förlag:University of Toronto Press

Utforska kategorier

Sociala och etiska frågor inom Samhälle och politik
Genusvetenskap inom Samhälle och politik
Medicinhistoria inom Medicin

Mer om författaren

Amy J. Shaw is an associate professor in the Department of History and Religion at the University of Lethbridge.V. Lynn Kennedy is an associate professor in the Department of History and Religion at the University of Lethbridge.

Innehållsförteckning

List of Figures and TablesIntroduction Section I: Epistemologies and Philosophies 1. The Enfleshment of Difference: Medicalizing and Gendering the Fat Body in the Nineteenth Century Kristen A. Hardy2. To Measure Skulls, to Measure Waists: The Nineteenth-Century Origins of Modern Health StandardsBessie Rigakos and Wesley R. BishopSection II: Weights and Measures 3. "All young things are fat if they are in health": The Shift from Qualitative to Quantitative Assessments of Infant Weight in the Nineteenth-Century United StatesV. Lynn Kennedy 4. Physical Culture and the Denial of Fat in fin de siècle AmericaConor Heffernan 5. Prison Bodies: The Height and Weight of Men in Canadian Prisons, 1874–1935L. Antonie, K. Inwood, and H. Maxwell-Stewart Section III: Cultural Representations and Constructions 6. Visual and Material Cultures of the Fat Body, 1780–1840: Representation, Commodification, and DisplayFreya Gowrley7. The Fat Body and Colonial Symbolism: Imperialism, Appetite, and Hunger in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of DarknessTatiana Konrad8. Visualizing the Body: The Mbopo Ritual and the Politics of Fatness in Southern Nigeria in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth CenturiesNsima UdoSection IV: Imperialism, Colonialism, and the Body Politic 9. Colonial Engorgement in the Pictorial Arts: "Fat" Uncle Sam in the Imperialist Debates, 1898–1902Bonnie M. Miller 10. Gaining in Flesh: Canadian Soldiers in the War in South AfricaAmy J. ShawConclusion BibliographyList of ContributorsIndex