Using work produced from the critical and postmodern arena in social sciences, this book examines three key areas - representation, identities and practice - to explore and interrogate how body and weight management, subjectivities, experiences and practices are constituted within and by the normative discourses of contemporary western culture.

Using work produced from the critical and postmodern arena in social sciences, this book examines three key areas - representation, identities and practice - to explore and interrogate how body and weight management, subjectivities, experiences and practices are constituted within and by the normative discourses of contemporary western culture.

Introducing Critical Bodies: Representations, Practices and Identities of Weight and Body Management; P.Markula , M.Burns & S.Riley SECTION 1: Representations and Constructions of Body Weight and Body Management; S.Wiggins Deconstructing Un/healthy Body Weight and Weight Management; H.Malson 'I Feel Ridiculous About Having Had It': Critical Readings of Lived and Mediated Stories on Eating Disorders; P.Saukko Learning to be Healthy, Dying to be Thin: The Representation of Weight Via Body Perfection Codes in Schools; E.Rich, & J.Evans SECTION 2: Constructing Embodied Identities; H.Frith Starving in Cyberspace: The Construction of Identity on 'Pro-eating-disorder' Websites; K.Day & T.Keys Body Talk: Negotiating Body Image and Masculinity; R.Gill Feminist Object Relations Theory and Eating 'Disorders'; C.Heenan SECTION 3: Meanings of Body Management Practices: Women's Experiences; P.Markula Dis/Orders of Weight Control: Bulimic and/or 'Healthy Weight' Practices; M.Burns & N.Gavey Sustaining Imbalance - Evidence of Neglect in the Pursuit of Nutritional Health; L.Aphramor & J.Gingras Older and Younger Women's Experiences of Commercial Weight Loss; D.Gimlin Critical Bodies: Discourses of Health, Gender and Consumption; S.Riley , H. Frith ,  S.Wiggins, P.Markula & M.Burns