Anorexic Bodies

Explores the ways in which anorexic women use their eating to control their bodies. The author argues that the female body in modern Western culture is understood as open and accessible, and female appetite as dangerous.

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This work is a feminist and sociological analysis of anorexia. Anorexia is a striking example of a "women's" illness. Many previous studies examine anorexia in isolation from history and politics. The author argues that this is inadequate. She tries to explore a set of complex theories which together explain anorexia more adequately. There are four stages in the argument. Looking at the premise that the body is a "concept" rather than a physical organism is the start of this process. The author then discusses different body concepts across time to show how the dominant social categories of culture shape how that culture understands the body. The next stage of the argument looks at how gender divisions are reflected in current understandings of the body, by examining access to, and representations of, women's bodies in rape and pornography. The third stage is to look at how anorexia is explained now, ie by examining how ideas about the female body inform both dominant and feminist analyses of anorexia. The final stage uses original interview material to demonstrate a sociological understanding of the construction of women's bodies.