Statements in which the resource exists as a subject.
PredicateObject
rdf:type
lifeskim:mentions
pubmed:issue
4
pubmed:dateCreated
2007-5-14
pubmed:abstractText
Based on the Body Mass Index (BMI, kg/m(2)), most men in nations such as the UK and USA are reportedly overweight or obese. This is authoritatively defined as a massive and growing problem. Drawing from embodied sociology, critical obesity literature and qualitative data generated during an Economic and Social Research Council funded project on masculinities and weight-related issues, this paper offers a critical realist contribution to the obesity debate. Rather than endorsing the institutionalised war on fat, and correcting so-called 'laymen' who dismiss medicalized weight-for-height recommendations, the following presents and honours men's justificatory accounts for levels of body mass that medicine labels too heavy (implicitly or explicitly too fat). Men's critical understandings, which are connected to their displays of moral worth, are considered under three headings: the compatibility of heaviness, healthiness and physical fitness; looking and feeling ill at a supposedly 'healthy' BMI; and resisting irrational standardisation. By empirically 'bringing in' men's meanings, sensibilities and culturally informed aesthetics, this paper casts a different light on medicalized measures that support potentially corrosive obesity epidemic psychology.
pubmed:language
eng
pubmed:journal
pubmed:citationSubset
IM
pubmed:status
MEDLINE
pubmed:month
May
pubmed:issn
0141-9889
pubmed:author
pubmed:issnType
Print
pubmed:volume
29
pubmed:owner
NLM
pubmed:authorsComplete
Y
pubmed:pagination
584-609
pubmed:dateRevised
2007-11-15
pubmed:meshHeading
pubmed:year
2007
pubmed:articleTitle
Body Mass Index, masculinities and moral worth: men's critical understandings of 'appropriate' weight-for-height.
pubmed:affiliation
Department of Sociology, University of Limerick, Ireland. lee.monaghan@ul.le
pubmed:publicationType
Journal Article, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't