Heavy Burdens: Stories of Motherhood and Fatness seeks to address the systemic ways in which the moral panic around “obesity” impacts fat mothers and fat children. Taking a life-course approach, the book begins with analyses of the ways in which fatphobia is enacted on pregnant (or even not-yet-pregnant) women, whose bodies immediately become viewed as objects warranting external control by not only medical professionals, but family members, and even passers-by. The story unfolds as adults recount childhood stories of growing up fat, or growing up in fear of being fat, and how their mothers’ relationships with their own bodies and attempted weight-loss experiences shaped how food, exercise, and body management were approached in their homes in sometimes harmful ways. Finally, the book concludes with stories of women who have since become mothers, examining the ways in which having their own children altered their views on their own bodies and their perceptions of their mothers’ actions, and working to find fat-friendly futures via their own parenting (or grand-parenting) techniques.

"Heavy Burdens: Stories of Motherhood and Fatness seeks to address the systemic ways in which the moral panic around obesity impacts fat mothers and fat children. Taking a life-course approach, the book begins with analyses of the ways in which fatphobia is enacted on pregnant (or even not-yet-pregnant) women, whose bodies immediately become viewed as objects warranting external control by not only medical professionals, but family members, and even passers-by. The story unfolds as adults recount childhood stories of growing up fat, or growing up in fear of being fat, and how their mothers relationships with their own bodies and attempted weight-loss experiences shaped how food, exercise, and body management were approached in their homes in sometimes harmful ways. Finally, the book concludes with stories of women who have since become mothers, examining the ways in which having their own children altered their views on their own bodies and their perceptions of their mothers actions, and working to find fat-friendly futures via their own parenting (or grand-parenting) techniques. This book contains the artwork, stories, and analyses of nearly 20 contributors, all of whom seek to change the ways in which fatness is perceived, experienced, and vilified. It is the editors hope that these works will compel readers to reconsider their negative views on fatness and to retain softness toward every mother and child who are simply fighting to exist in the face of fatphobia"--Back cover.

The Contemporary Reader of Gender and Fat Studies is a key reference work in contemporary scholarship situated at the intersection between Gender and Fat Studies, charting the connections and tensions between these two fields. Comprising over 20 chapters from a range of diverse and international contributors, the Reader is structured around the following key themes: theorizing gender and fat; narrating gender and fat; historicizing gender and fat; institutions and public policy; health and medicine; popular culture and media; and resistance. It is an intersectional collection, highlighting the ways that "gender" and "fat" always exist in connection with multiple other structures, forms of oppression, and identities, including race, ethnicity, sexualities, age, nationalities, disabilities, religion, and class. The Contemporary Reader of Gender and Fat Studies is essential reading for scholars and advanced students in Gender Studies, Sexuality Studies, Sociology, Body Studies, Cultural Studies, Psychology, and Health. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.

The Routledge International Handbook of Fat Studies brings together a diverse body of work from around the globe and across a wide range of Fat Studies topics and perspectives. The first major collection of its kind, it explores the epistemology, ontology, and methodology of fatness, with attention to issues such as gender and sexuality, disability and embodiment, health, race, media, discrimination, and pedagogy. Presenting work from both scholarly writers and activists, this volume reflects a range of critical perspectives vital to the expansion of Fat Studies and thus constitutes an essential resource for researchers in the field.

The Routledge Handbook of Critical Obesity Studies is an authoritative and challenging guide to the breadth and depth of critical thinking and theory on obesity. Rather than focusing on obesity as a public health crisis to be solved, this reference work offers divergent and radical strategies alongside biomedical and positivist discourses. Comprised of thirty nine original chapters from internationally recognised academics, as well as emerging scholars, the Handbook engages students, academics, researchers and practitioners in contemporary critical scholarship on obesity; encourages engagement of social science and related disciplines in critical thinking and theorising on obesity; enhances critical theoretical and methodological work in the area, highlighting potential gaps as well as strengths; relates critical scholarship to new and evolving areas of obesity-related practices, policies and research. This multidisciplinary and international collection is designed for a broad audience of academics, researchers, students and practitioners within the social and health sciences, including sociology, obesity science, public health, medicine, sports studies, fat studies, psychology, nutrition science, education and disability studies.

Interdisciplinary and intersectional in emphasis, the Routledge Companion to Motherhood brings together essays on current intellectual themes, issues, and debates, while also creating a foundation for future scholarship and study as the field of Motherhood Studies continues to develop globally. This Routledge Companion is the first extensive collection on the wide-ranging topics, themes, issues, and debates that ground the intellectual work being done on motherhood. Global in scope and including a range of disciplinary perspectives, including anthropology, literature, communication studies, sociology, women’s and gender studies, history, and economics, this volume introduces the foundational topics and ideas in motherhood, delineates the diversity and complexity of mothering, and also stimulates dialogue among scholars and students approaching from divergent backgrounds and intellectual perspectives. This will become a foundational text for academics in Women's and Gender Studies and interdisciplinary researchers interested in this important, complex and rapidly growing topic. Scholars of psychology, sociology or public policy, and activists in both university and workplace settings interested in motherhood and mothering will find it an invaluable guide.

This wonderful collection of hand-picked Thanksgiving classics will make you fall in love with our sweet little stories and will become a part of your Thanksgiving story-telling traditions: An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving (Louisa May Alcott) The First Thanksgiving (Albert F. Blaisdell, Francis K. Ball) Aunt Susanna's Thanksgiving Dinner (Lucy Maud Montgomery) The Genesis of the Doughnut Club (Lucy Maud Montgomery) An English Dinner of Thanksgiving (George Eliot) Ezra's Thanksgivin' Out West (Eugene Field) John Inglefield's Thanksgiving (Nathaniel Hawthorne) Helen's Thanksgiving (Susan Coolidge) Thanksgiving at the Polls (Edward Everett Hale) Millionaire Mike's Thanksgiving (Eleanor H. Porter) The Thanksgiving of the Wazir (Andrew Lang) The Master of the Harvest (Mrs. Alfred Gatty) How We Kept Thanksgiving at Oldtown (Harriet Beecher Stowe) The Queer Little Baker Man (Phila Butler Bowman) A Turkey for the Stuffing (Katherine Grace Hulbert) Mrs. November's Party (Agnes Carr) The Debut of Dan'l Webster (Isabel Gordon Curtis) The Kingdom of the Greedy (P. J. Stahl) Thankful (Mary E. Wilkins Freeman) Beetle Ring's Thanksgiving Mascot (Sheldon C. Stoddard) Mistress Esteem Elliott's Molasses Cake (Kate Upson Clark) Thanksgiving at Todd's Asylum (Winthrop Packard) Wishbone Valley (R. K. Munkittrick) Patem's Salmagundi (E. S. Brooks) Miss November's Dinner Party (Agnes Carr) The Story of Ruth and Naomi (Bible) Bert's Thanksgiving (J. T. Trowbridge) How Obadiah Brought About a Thanksgiving (Emily Hewitt Leland) The White Turkey's Wing (Sophie Swett) The Thanksgiving Goose (Fannie Wilder Brown) A Novel Postman (Alice Wheildon) Chip's Thanksgiving (Annie Hamilton Donnell) A Thanksgiving Dinner (Edna Payson Brett) Two Old Boys (Pauline Shackleford Colyar) Mon-daw-min (H. R. Schoolcraft) A Mystery in the Kitchen (Olive Thorne Miller) Who Ate the Dolly's Dinner? (Isabel Gordon Curtis) An Old-fashioned Thanksgiving (Rose Terry Cooke) The Night before Thanksgiving (Sarah Jewett)...