Link: ‘You Cannot Shame Me’: 2 New Books Tear Down ‘Fat Girl’ Stereotypes

Usually when I post links to interesting articles, they’re a few years old, things I’ve stumbled across doing research or something of that sort.  But today, I’m delighted to be able to signal boost something that not only was released today, but that I came across listening to the radio on the way to work.  NPR’s Morning Edition ran a piece about two recently published novels whose protagonists struggle with fatness, 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl by Mona Awad and Dietland by Sarai Walker.  The piece isn’t about film (although Walker’s novel is being turned into a TV show and she mentions film when talking about the need for more fat characters in media), but it does touch on many points that are familiar territory for this blog:  the need to deconstruct the narrative of a sad fat person finding happiness when they lose weight, the intersections of gender and fatness, and the difficulty and necessity of reclaiming the word “fat.”  Plus it’s an article from a mainstream news source about fat people that doesn’t go into Obesity Epidemic Panic Mode.  Not too shabby.

3 comments

  1. I tuned into this as it was airing as well, towards the end of the segment. As soon as I figured out they were discussing fatness, I immediately went into “uh oh, when does the concern about fat being unhealthy start?” mode. But I’m glad they handled it well.

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