1st Edition

Anorexic Bodies A Feminist and Sociological Perspective on Anorexia Nervosa

By Morag MacSween, Morag Macsween Copyright 1993
    280 Pages
    by Routledge

    280 Pages
    by Routledge

    This book explores the ways in which anorexic women use their eating to control their bodies. It argues that the female body in modern Western culture is understood as open and accessible and female appetite as dangerous and voracious. Anorexia attempts to resist both these constructions in the creation of a closed, desireless body. Since anorexic women resist the power of collective ideologies their resistance cannot work - the closed body becomes its own prison.

    Introduction 1. The discovery of the concept 2. The enigma variations: psychiatric explanations of anorexia 3. Women's oppression: feminist explanations of anorexia 4. Anorexic meanings 5. The sociology of the body 6. The feminine body 7. The anorexic sympton 8. Conclusion: the anorexic body Bibliography

    Biography

    Morag MacSween

    'Convincing and highly accessible ... a significant addition to the existing literature.' - Journal of Gender Studies