I'm giving a presentation at King's College on the Strand in London on 18 May. It is the first in the Gender Matters seminar series 'Gender and Mental Well Being: Inter-disciplinary Perspectives'. Gender Matters is a research group based at King's.
The organisers have given this talk the title of 'Obesity and the Rejection of Body Normativity' and I'll be talking about fat activism and mental health. I'll use accessible language and hopefully make it interesting. The seminar is open to members of the public, so please come. It's free and there's a wine reception afterwards - crikey.
Obesity and the Rejection of Body Normativity
Gender and Mental Well Being: Inter-disciplinary Perspectives
King's College, Strand campus
18 May 2011
17.30
"She was so viscerally happy in that moment" - Fat Activism for Well Being
Charlotte Cooper
Abstract
In this presentation I assert that dominant obesity discourse in 21st century Western culture is steeped in the abjection of fat people, and that this impacts negatively on our health. As I have argued previously, a Social Model of fat activism remedies this problem by addressing systemic fat hatred and helping to create more liveable lives for fat people (Cooper, 1998). Fat activism re-imagines fat embodiment and agency, collectively it spans continents and has historical links over four decades. I will talk about my research into this social movement, and present case studies which both support and reject body normativity.
Cooper, C. (1998) Fat & Proud: The Politics of Size, London: The Women's Press.
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