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In The Metamorphoses of Fat, Georges Vigarello maps the evolution of Western ideas about fat and fat people from the Middle Ages to the present, focusing on the formative influence of science, fashion, fitness crazes, and public health campaigns. While hefty bodies were once a sign of power, today those who struggle to lose weight are considered poor in character and weak in mind. Vigarello traces the eventual equation of fatness with infirmity and examines the way we have come to define ourselves and others in terms of body type.
Tracing the link between changing attitudes toward body size and modern conceptions of class, society, and self.
In short, the breadth and detail of the account presented here provides a valuable resource for researchers to begin to understand the multiplicity of approaches to fatness over time.
The most impressive history of corpulence to date... essential reading for anyone wishing to understand how our modern preoccupations with size, weight, health, beauty, and morality have changed over time.
Enjoyable and useful. Vigarello manages to deliver an impresive amount of material in less than two hundred pages.... Thought-provoking and entertaining.
A brilliant piece of work.... A great opening point to the many opaque aspects of the consequences of body size for the fate of individuals and societies for future historians to explore.
At once compelling and ground-breaking... this work represents all that is best in new histories of the body.
Overall, a useful resource on the sociology and history of obesity...
Vigarello masterfully traces...the stigmatization of the fat person over time.
Vigarello offers up a grande bouffe of food for thought, tracing the impact of evolving mores and medicines on society's perception of an often stigmatized condition.
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