Michael Gard – författare

The Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies is an authoritative and challenging guide to the breadth and depth of critical thinking and theory on obesity. Rather than focusing on obesity as a public health crisis to be solved, this reference work offers divergent and radical strategies alongside biomedical and positivist discourses.

Comprised of thirty nine original chapters from internationally recognised academics, as well as emerging scholars, the Handbook engages students, academics, researchers and practitioners in contemporary critical scholarship on obesity; encourages engagement of social science and related disciplines in critical thinking and theorising on obesity; enhances critical theoretical and methodological work in the area, highlighting potential gaps as well as strengths; relates critical scholarship to new and evolving areas of obesity-related practices, policies and research.

This multidisciplinary and international collection is designed for a broad audience of academics, researchers, students and practitioners within the social and health sciences, including sociology, obesity science, public health, medicine, sports studies, fat studies, psychology, nutrition science, education and disability studies.

The Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies is an authoritative and challenging guide to the breadth and depth of critical thinking and theory on obesity. Rather than focusing on obesity as a public health crisis to be solved, this reference work offers divergent and radical strategies alongside biomedical and positivist discourses.

Comprised of thirty nine original chapters from internationally recognised academics, as well as emerging scholars, the Handbook engages students, academics, researchers and practitioners in contemporary critical scholarship on obesity; encourages engagement of social science and related disciplines in critical thinking and theorising on obesity; enhances critical theoretical and methodological work in the area, highlighting potential gaps as well as strengths; relates critical scholarship to new and evolving areas of obesity-related practices, policies and research.

This multidisciplinary and international collection is designed for a broad audience of academics, researchers, students and practitioners within the social and health sciences, including sociology, obesity science, public health, medicine, sports studies, fat studies, psychology, nutrition science, education and disability studies.

Despite apocalyptic predictions from a vocal alliance of health professionals, politicians and social commentators that rising obesity levels would lead to a global health crisis, the crisis has not materialised. In this provocative follow up to his classic work of obesity scepticism, The Obesity Epidemic, Michael Gard argues that we have entered into a new, and perhaps terminal, phase of the obesity debate.

Evidence suggests that obesity rates are levelling off in Western societies, life expectancies continue to rise in line with rising obesity rates, and across the world policy-makers have remained largely indifferent and inactive in the face of this apparently deadly threat to our health and well-being. Dissecting and dismissing much of the over-blown rhetoric and ideological bias found on both sides of the obesity debate, Gard demonstrates that the science of obesity remains radically uncertain and that it is impossible to establish an objective ‘truth’ on which to base policy. His powerful and inescapable conclusion is that we should now mark the end of the obesity epidemic.

Offering a road map through the maze of claims and counter-claims, while still holding to a sceptical standpoint, this book provides an unparalleled anatomy of obesity as a scientific, political and cultural issue. It is essential reading for anybody with an interest in the science or sociology of health and lifestyle.

Despite apocalyptic predictions from a vocal alliance of health professionals, politicians and social commentators that rising obesity levels would lead to a global health crisis, the crisis has not materialised. In this provocative follow up to his classic work of obesity scepticism, The Obesity Epidemic, Michael Gard argues that we have entered into a new, and perhaps terminal, phase of the obesity debate.

Evidence suggests that obesity rates are levelling off in Western societies, life expectancies continue to rise in line with rising obesity rates, and across the world policy-makers have remained largely indifferent and inactive in the face of this apparently deadly threat to our health and well-being. Dissecting and dismissing much of the over-blown rhetoric and ideological bias found on both sides of the obesity debate, Gard demonstrates that the science of obesity remains radically uncertain and that it is impossible to establish an objective ‘truth’ on which to base policy. His powerful and inescapable conclusion is that we should now mark the end of the obesity epidemic.

Offering a road map through the maze of claims and counter-claims, while still holding to a sceptical standpoint, this book provides an unparalleled anatomy of obesity as a scientific, political and cultural issue. It is essential reading for anybody with an interest in the science or sociology of health and lifestyle.

Increasing obesity levels are currently big news but do we think carefully enough about what this trend actually means? Everybody – including doctors, parents, teachers, sports clubs, businesses and governments – has a role to play in the ‘war on obesity’. But is talk of an obesity ‘crisis’ justified? Is it the product of measured scientific reasoning or age-old ‘habits of mind’? Why is it happening now? And are there potential risks associated with talking about obesity as an ‘epidemic’?

The Obesity Epidemic proposes that obesity science and the popular media present a complex mix of ambiguous knowledge, familiar (yet unstated) moral agendas and ideological assumptions.

Increasing obesity levels are currently big news but do we think carefully enough about what this trend actually means? Everybody – including doctors, parents, teachers, sports clubs, businesses and governments – has a role to play in the ‘war on obesity’. But is talk of an obesity ‘crisis’ justified? Is it the product of measured scientific reasoning or age-old ‘habits of mind’? Why is it happening now? And are there potential risks associated with talking about obesity as an ‘epidemic’?

The Obesity Epidemic proposes that obesity science and the popular media present a complex mix of ambiguous knowledge, familiar (yet unstated) moral agendas and ideological assumptions.

This edited collection problematizes trajectories of health promotion across the lifespan. It provides a distinctive critical social science perspective of the various directions taken by dominant policies in their approach to promoting sport for all ages. It offers an array of theoretical and methodologically diverse perspectives on this topic, and highlights the intersections between different life stages and social, economic and cultural factors in the developed world, including class, gender, ability, family dynamics and/or race.

Sport and Physical Activity across the Lifespan critically explores dominant policies of age-focussed sport promotion in order to highlight its implications within the context of particular life stages as they intersect with social, cultural and economic factors. This includes an examination of organised sport for pre-schoolers; ‘at-risk’ youth sport programmes; and the creation of sporting sub-cultures within the mid-life ‘market’.