PCOS Discourses, Symbolic Impacts, and Feminist Rhetorical Disruptions of Institutional Hegemonies

This book examines media and clinical discourses and their impact on women with PCOS. Findings from the study reveal that while women with PCOS have limited agency in constructing and representing their identities and ontologies in traditional media, by networking in participatory new media, these women can reclaim their agency.

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Rhetorical Investigations of the Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome Body in Media: Countering a Wicked Problem examines the power of hegemonic institutions and their impact on bodies. Marissa C. McKinley focuses on how women with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) employ rhetorical strategies to resist mass media and clinical discourses that seek to define them. The lack of PCOS diagnostic consensus, the complexity of the illness, and the limited knowledge about PCOS makes it generally and clinically misunderstood and, therefore, difficult to manage by providers. This book rhetorically examines three PCOS artifacts—a television episode, an online popular culture forum, and an online health forum. Findings reveal that while women with PCOS have limited agency in constructing and representing their identities and ontologies in traditional media, by networking in participatory new media, these women can reclaim their agency. Scholars of communication, rhetoric, feminist studies, and medical humanities will find this book of particular interest.