This essay seeks to provide a re-articulation of eating disorders’ history using feminist historiography.
creator
Laura
creator
Stamm
creator
Stamm, Laura
Title
Personal Problems Are Political Problems: The Gendered History of Disordered Eating
Alternative Title
Gendered History of Disordered Eating
advisor
Astrid
advisor
Henry
advisor
Henry, Astrid, 1966-
Index Date
2012
Date Created
2012-01-01
Publisher
Grinnell College
Type of Resource
text
Type of Resource
text
Genre
research paper
Digital Origin
born digital
Digital Extent
26 pages
Media Type
application/pdf
description
This essay seeks to provide a re-articulation of eating disorders’ history using feminist historiography—a type of feminist historiography in which lived experiences serve not as evidence for a theorization but as a starting point for historicizing the discourses and structures that shape each experience. I look to feminist historiography as a way of countering the masculinist, institutionalized scientific discourses that have been used to define eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia. Limited conceptions of eating disorders that focus on individual deviation deny the multivalency and complexity of disorder eating. Using my own experiences as a starting point, I historically map eating disorders within their cultural contexts to demonstrate that temporally specific discursive practices shape anorexia, bulimia, and other disorders not otherwise specified. Understanding eating disorders as shaped by structural forces opens up possibilities for new types of eating disorder treatment that do not construct eating disorders as private, secretive issues but make them an issue for public concern and discussion. Eating disorders are a collective problem with a collective history(ies); we need collective solutions that address each person’s own participation/implication in the sociocultural discourses that create eating disorders.
Language
English
Topic
Anorexia nervosa
Topic
Eating disorders
Topic
Sociological aspects
Topic
Bulimia
Keyword
Frederick Baumann Essay Prize (2012)
Classification
RC552.E18
Related Item
Frederick Baumann Essay Prize
Related Item
Digital Grinnell
Related Item
Student Scholarship
Identifier (local)
grinnell:110
Access Condition
Copyright to this work is held by the author(s), in accordance with United States copyright law (USC 17). Readers of this work have certain rights as defined by the law, including but not limited to fair use (17 USC 107 et seq.).