To Eat or Not to Eat: Gender, Typologies, and Eating Practices of Women with Larger Bodies

Abstract

This paper focuses on practices, which concern food, and which are examined as components of the process of construction of the subject from fatness. In other words, practices and tipologies are analyzed as dispositions and acts aimed at the appropriation of the subject in order to stop being the object of looks or prejudices regarding the way he/she eats, to become subjects of their own food experiences. Using an ethnographic methodology, two contrasting groups of self-identified fat women are approached. We investigate how, through their practices, they construct typologies that guide their decisions about what they eat, to gain greater ownership of their bodies and lives.