Fat Talk

Author: Mimi NICHTER
ISBN: 9780674006812

Teen-aged girls hate their bodies and diet obsessively, or so we hear. News stories and reports of survey research often claim that as many as three girls in five are on a diet at any given time, and they grimly suggest that many are âeoeat riskâe for eating disorders. But how much can we believe these frightening stories? What do teenagers mean when they say they are dieting?Anthropologist Mimi Nichter spent three years interviewing middle school and high school girlsâe"lower-middle to middle class, white, black, and Latinaâe"about their feelings concerning appearance, their eating habits, and dieting. In Fat Talk, she tells us what the girls told her, and explores the influence of peers, family, and the media on girlsâe(tm) sense of self. Letting girls speak for themselves, she gives us the human side of survey statistics.Most of the white girls in her study disliked something about their bodies and knew all too well that they did not look like the envied, hated âeoeperfect gir

Publisher: Harvard University Press
Publish Date: 2001-11-02

Subjects: Psychology / Developmental / Adolescent, Psychology / Psychopathology / Eating Disorders

This book is available in the following Community Centers: Women's Center (Location: Parenting)