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This light-hearted and entertaining book, authored by top psychologist David Cohen, explores the influences and impacts on our perception of body image, examining the power of appearance and the psychology behind how we think and feel about ourselves physically.Packed with scientific findings alongside historical anecdotes and humorous insights, the book first looks at the history of body image and appearance, and how ideals of beauty have changed over time. It goes on to note the rise of the beauty and fashion industries, looking at how society, culture and the media can affect body image. The final section deals with issues of body dissatisfaction and the treatments and therapy available for those struggling with body image and mental health. Along the way, readers will meet a cast of characters from Elizabeth I, a daring, medieval Welsh poet, an Egyptian mummy with the first known tattoo, Paul F. Schilder who pioneered the study of body image, and the brave recipients of the first face transplants, among many more.In his trademark engaging style, Cohen offers a rich account of the psychology of body image through the ages and through the lifespan. It is valuable reading for students of psychology and professionals and therapists aiming to promote body positivity.

This book is the first of its kind to explore how women challenge the powerful sociocultural and gendered phenomenon of diet culture across the broad anti-diet movement and beyond. Showcasing the voices of over 150 everyday women, activists, and health professionals across Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom, the author provides new insight into anti-diet practices while giving agency for women who remain main targets of diet culture. Using Pierre Bourdieu's concept of habitus as a novel starting point to develop a concept of the diet habitus, the author explores the possibility of a fragmented but unified diet counterculture. Drawing on feminist perspectives from women's and fat liberation movements, the author demonstrates that women's anti-diet practices are grounded in a combination of self and society; one that has the power to significantly re-shape the broad landscape of food and eating for women. This international book appeals to scholars, students, activists and health professionals interested in the intersections of the sociology of the body, fat studies, sociology of food and nutrition, social movements, health sociology, and women's studies.

'I can't do that until I've lost a bit of weight'.'I need to slim down first'.'When I'm thinner I'll...'What if you didn't feel held back by your body? This guide helps you to free yourself from harmful social attitudes about weight and to start living now.Break the Binds of Weight Stigma draws on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), a positive, action-based form of therapy that works by accepting your natural emotions and using your own personal values to build a path to the life you want to live. Stories, worksheets, reflection questions, and guided exercises show you how to embrace yourself and fight back against the social structures that tie value to size. This is not a book about changing your body or losing weight. It's a guide to help you connect with the things that are important to you regardless of your weight. It's a step towards countering the harmful messages in society about our bodies. It's a movement. It's radical. It's freedom.

Manboobs is Komail Aijazuddin's riotous yet intelligent memoir of searching for love, seamlessly blending humor, politics, pop culture, and the bravery required to be yourself. Aijazuddin confidently announces himself as a sharp new voice in humor with his moving, wickedly funny reexamination of the American Dream and our search for home.'One of the funniest books I've ever read.'—EDMUND WHITE “One of the best-written memoirs I've ever read—I couldn't put it down. The humor is so sharp, so delicious, so irresistible. What a remarkable feat.” —ALOK VAID-MENON “At once both humorous and heartbreaking, [Aijazuddin's] memoir allows his bubbly personality to shine in a story about letting go of shame and finding self-acceptance.” —WASHINGTON POST “[A] sterling debut... Aijazuddin combines blazing wit with heartbreaking candor as he recounts his path toward self-acceptance as a gay Pakistani.” —PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, starred review I'm just a man, standing in front of a salad, asking it to be a cake. What do you do when you're too gay for Pakistan, too Pakistani to be gay in America, and you're ashamed of your body everywhere? How can you find happiness despite years of humiliation, physical danger, and a legion of Brooklyn hipsters who know you only as a queer from Whereveristan? How do you summon the courage to be yourself no matter where you are? Even as a young child in Lahore, Komail Aijazuddin knew he was different—no one else at his all-boys prep school was pirouetting off their desks, or bullied for their “manboobs,” or spontaneously bursting into songs from The Little Mermaid. Aijazuddin began to believe his only chance at a happy, meaningful life would be found elsewhere: America, the land of the free, the home of the gays. But the hostility of a post-9/11 world and society's rejection of his art, his desires, and his body would soon teach him that finding happiness takes a lot more than a plane ticket. Searching for his place between two worlds while navigating a minefield of expectations, prejudice, and self-doubt, Aijazuddin discovered, sometimes painfully, sometimes hilariously, that there are people and places he'd need to let go of to move forward.

The digital sphere, especially social media, is perceived as a new form of public sphere where individuals can share and circulate information and participate in formal and informal democratic processes albeit in the context of echo chambers and confirmation biases. Gender in the Digital Sphere explores how we represent, express, and engage with the digital world via the lens of gender. Each chapter touches on one of the three pillars of engagement, expression, or representation in relation to the digital world, and themes range from social media, body image and identity to feminist activism to gender and digital narratives. The contributors raise important questions about the impact of digital media in everyday life and make connections between theory and everyday accounts of gender and technology.

Too many of us are living disconnected from our bodies, chasing a constantly moving target of'ideal,'and accepting the societal narrative about which bodies are deserving of safety and protection. In an effort to keep ourselves safe, we shame, push aside, and assimilate parts of ourselves that don't align with the cultural norm. In turn, we are disconnected from our bodies and therefore from our humanity, losing sight of the true nature of who we are and who we were born to be.Your Body Is a Revolution is an invitation to reclaim what has been stolen from us, to embrace the wisdom our bodies long to share, and to fully inhabit our lives--perhaps for the first time. Embodiment coach Tara Teng helps us untangle ourselves from centuries of body-based oppression built into our societal systems or masquerading as religion and teaches us to slow down and listen to the wisdom that comes through somatic practices. When we embrace right relationship with our bodies, we also come into right relationship with all things: ourselves, each other, the earth, and our spirituality.Book your ticket home: home to your body. Take back what society says is too much, too loud, too feminine, too masculine, too gay, too worldly, too unique to fit into the restrictive mold built by patriarchy, colonization, and white supremacy. Come back home to the place you were always searching for. Here, your whole self is welcome.

This practical, accessible book teaches readers how to practice healthy body image habits and let go of an emphasis on body image through research, activities, and personal stories.Body neutrality is a body image approach focused on finding acceptance and liberation from the body-focused culture in which we live. Body neutrality is a shift toward seeing our bodies as a vessel of who we are rather than as who we are. This guide is organized into thirteen chapters, each outlining a different concept of body neutrality ranging from comparison and identity to mindfulness and gratitude, inviting participation from the reader through end-of-chapter activities. For anyone aiming to release the enslaving emphasis placed on appearance in a world where body obsession has become inappropriately “normal,” this book will provide insight and practical guidance toward freedom.Body Neutrality is for anyone struggling with self-esteem and body image issues who aims for acceptance and liberation.

Dietitian and nutrition therapist Leslie Schilling turns diet culture on its head with a radical new message: We aren't designed to diet.Diet culture is a system of oppression that values only certain types of bodies and equates thinness with health. It permeates American society and even lurks in our safest spaces, such as schools, medical offices, and places of worship. But when you begin to see its lies for what they are, you can fight back, build resilience and self-esteem, and trust your divine design.Leslie Schilling has counseled hundreds of people every year who struggle with food, body image, chronic dieting, and disordered eating. She helps them understand diet-culture myths, fight the lies we've been told (and sold), and discover the truth about health, well-being, and how God sees our bodies—all bodies—as good.In Feed Yourself, you'll learn how to:Identify the lies of diet culture.Understand that health is far more than what we eat or how we move.Escape the shame and guilt you may feel about your body.Trust your body and recognize its cues and needs.Find freedom in food and learn to define health on your own terms.Discussion questions, charts to help you discern diet culture, and recommended readings are included in the audiobook companion PDF download.

“An incredible resource for those who are looking to find greater peace with their bodies in order to live a more empowered, joyful, and meaningful life.” —Matt McGorryA life-changing guide to reclaiming your relationship with your body—and yourselfHave you ever thought that if only you could change the way you looked, your life would be better? It's so easy to imagine that by changing the outside of our bodies, we'd feel better on the inside. But we all know that even if we could magically attain a so-called “perfect” body, our problems wouldn't actually be solved. That's because body image issues are never just about the body: they're always about something deeper inside.As a longtime personal trainer and coach, Jessi Kneeland has seen hundreds of clients achieve their fitness goals but still feel trapped in a web of body hatred, anxiety, obsession, and dysmorphia. Searching for a solution, Kneeland set out on a quest to discover what it truly takes to help people understand, process, and heal their body image issues for good. They share their discoveries in Body Neutral, where you'll learn: The power of “body neutrality”—the ability to accept and respect your body, even if it isn't the way you'd prefer it to be.Which of the four “body image avatars”—each of which represents a different root cause for body image issues—aligns with you and your relationship with your body: the self-objectifier, the high achiever, the outsider, or the runner.Actionable and unique methods to help you strip away the layers of false meaning, excess power, moral significance, and shame that have been preventing you from both connecting to and appreciating your body, and feeling truly worthy as a person. There is a reason you're unhappy with your body, and Body Neutral will help you discover what that reason is and how to defuse its power, freeing you to enjoy a life of true confidence, security, and satisfaction.

From author and wellness personality Chrissy King, an exciting, genre-redefining narrative mix of memoir, inspiration, and activities and prompts, with timely messages about social and racial justice and how the world needs to move beyond body positivity to something even more exciting and revolutionary: body liberation.When Chrissy King first joined a gym, she had one goal in mind: to “get skinny.” In pursuit of this goal, she fell into the all-too-common cycle of “not enough-ness”; no matter what she achieved, there was always something she felt she needed to change about her body, her appearance, herself. This made her realize the most liberating truth of all: She was not the problem. Diet and fitness industries rooted in white supremacy were the problem; Eurocentric and carefully manufactured beauty standards were the problem; discourses telling her that her happiness was directly tied to her physical appearance were the problem. So she created an actionable method to redefine the relationship we have with our bodies, thereby achieving a sense of self-worth that is completely separate from how we look.The Body Liberation Project is about finding actual freedom in our bodies by discovering strength and aspects of fitness, movement, and eating that work for YOU. It's about realizing that the goal is not to look at our bodies and love everything we see; it's to understand that at our essence we are so much more than our bodies. But it's also about recognizing the harsh realities that prohibit people in marginalized bodies from being able to do so. Society constantly bombards those who fall outside Eurocentric standards of beauty (think Black, fat, trans, etc.) with the message that they are less attractive, and part of the journey toward body liberation is examining your own privilege, acknowledging the harm you may be causing others, and mourning your old ideas about what a body “should” look like. Recognizing that none of us are free until all of us are, Chrissy King shares the wisdom, the tools, and the inspiration to motivate readers to find body liberation and, even more important, to pass it on.

A holistic and powerful framework for accepting and liberating our bodies, and ourselves.Have you ever felt uncomfortable or not “at home” in your body? In this book, the founders of Body Trust, licensed therapist Hilary Kinavey and registered dietician Dana Sturtevant, invite readers to break free from the status quo and reject a diet culture that has taken advantage and profited from trauma, stigma, and disembodiment, and fully reclaim and embrace their bodies. Informed by the personal body stories of the hundreds of people they have worked with, Reclaiming Body Trust delineates an intersectional, social justice−orientated path to healing in three phases: The Rupture, The Reckoning, and The Reclamation. Throughout, readers will be anchored by the authors'innovative and revolutionary Body Trust framework to discover a pathway out of a rigid, mechanistic way of thinking about the body and into a more authentic, sustainable way to occupy and nurture our bodies.

'The Power of Plus will leave you feeling inspired, motivated, and ready to push for real change, as well as confident and encouraged to embrace yourself, just as you are. This is essential reading for anyone who truly cares about the future of fashion, and for anyone who believes in the power of being yourself.'—Versha Sharma, editor in chief, Teen VoguePlus-size fashion revolutionizes the way women view themselves and their bodies. Exclusivity runs within the foundation of fashion. While calls for diversity have intensified recently, long-held attitudes are only beginning to change. But through social media, plus-size people have been able to create supportive communities that show their confidence, strength, and beauty. Plus-size fashionistas have been writing their own narrative for the past three decades, creating a market all on their own that is now worth more than $21 billion. The Power of Plus features interviews with trailblazers such as Tess Holliday, Emme Aronson, Gabi Gregg, and more as it follows the evolution of plus-size fashion from its start on small blogs to its current boom, examining the way this market has changed women's relationships with their bodies and how plus-size fashion is integral to the future success of the industry. Plus-size fashion is not a PR stunt. It is a culture-changing market created by and for the people who have always deserved to feel stylish but never had the visibility to be... until now. By honoring our progress so far, The Power of Plus celebrates the next stage of the plus-size fashion movement.

Discover a fresh approach to moving, fueling, and loving your good body well!So many of us feel as though accepting our bodies means abandoning any effort to improve. We look in the mirror and tell ourselves that we are going to love the skin we are in, but most days our inner self-critic is all we can hear. We constantly ask ourselvesHow can I have a healthy lifestyle that will keep me motivated and inspired?Why does it even matter how I think about my body? Can't I just lose weight and be happy?What is it going to take for me to be content with the way I look, even if I'm not thin?But there is hope! Pursuing the healthiest version of you means learning to love the reflection in the mirror, and Jennifer Wagner understands this all too well. From looking at her today, you wouldn't know that she used to weigh 336 pounds. During her 16-year health and wellness journey, she has felt the deep anguish of torment from peers and strangers, let the scale dictate her moods, and cried herself to sleep all because of her'imperfect'body. But ultimately, Jennifer realized that to overcome the overwhelming negative feelings about her body, she needed to start with her mind and let go of all the expectations of perfection that were keeping her from being the best version of herself.Embark on this journey with Jennifer as your guide and learn to live a life of healthy habits and positive motivation to take care of your good body.

Comment se développe l'image corporelle? Quelles sont ses particularités chez les personnes de poids plus élevé, d'orientation sexuelle ou d'identité de genre minoritaires ou présentant des maladies comme le cancer? L'image corporelle se modifie-t-elle au cours de la vie? Comment pouvons-nous l'évaluer et de quelle manière pouvons-nous favoriser une image corporelle positive chez les jeunes, les adultes et les personnes d'âge avancé? Le rapport et les représentations que nous avons de notre propre corps font partie de notre quotidien. Le fil d'actualité montre bien à quel point l'image corporelle nous habite et nous préoccupe. Il s'agit d'un concept complexe, nécessitant d'être analysé et compris sous des perspectives à la fois différentes et complémentaires. En s'appuyant sur l'expertise d'une quarantaine de spécialistes canadiens, européens et américains, le présent ouvrage brosse le portrait des caractéristiques et des ramifications de l'image corporelle. Il s'intéresse à ses manifestations dans les contextes amoureux, communautaires et scolaires, ainsi que chez différents groupes d'individus tels que les enfants ou les athlètes. Il aborde les pratiques d'évaluation et d'intervention les plus à jour et reconnues, en plus d'explorer des avenues de traitement prometteuses et moins traditionnelles comme la réalité virtuelle et les pratiques psychocorporelles.

Body dissatisfaction and weight stigma can lead to debilitating physical and mental health consequences, such as eating disorders, body dysmorphic disorder, compulsive exercising, excessive dieting and cosmetic procedures. This book explores how we can better understand and accept our bodies and ourselves, offering helpful advice on how young people can build better body image. We come in all shapes and sizes, so let's celebrate our individuality and diversity.

'A must read'JAMIE WINDUST'A beautifully honest book'JUNO ROCHE'A superb and necessary book'BEN PECHEYAs a young, queer, plus-size person, Essie Dennis has spent a lot of time feeling like they weren't enough - not queer enough, not feminine enough, not perfect enough. When they took to social media to share how they felt, they were overwhelmed by how many others felt the same.I look too masculine to be non-binaryI look too feminine to be a lesbian Am I too fat for drag?Inviting you to challenge accepted beauty standards and the concept of'the perfect body', Essie takes everything they have learned on their journey to self-acceptance and body satisfaction to help guide you towards loving your queer body. From gender, sexuality and reclaiming your body, through to food, politics, social media and fatphobia, this radical book starts a conversation about body image and mental health that queer people are so often left out of.Fiercely and unapologetically written, and with honest advice and powerful stories from a diverse range of queer people throughout, this is an inspiring and necessary book that will show you that you are enough.

At a time when pornography is more accessible than ever and many young people are inadvisably turning to pornography to learn about sex and relationships, this book explores what pornography is, the politics behind pornography, how it can affect both sexual and non-sexual relationships and the effects of pornography on mental health. The book also covers the important wider topics of the making and sharing of inappropriate images and over exposure to porn contributing to what is becoming known as'rape culture'. It includes full lesson plans, activities, photocopiable materials and clear information on how to implement the programme, including outlines for staff CPD sessions and parent workshops.This book will be vital for PSHE teachers, senior leadership teams, pastoral care teams, school counsellors, youth workers, school nurses, and anyone who might be involved in sex education provision for young people.

Learn to sew beautiful, simple handmade clothes and begin a journey to loving the body you have.Draft patterns and sew clothes that fit your unique body! In this garment-making primer, sewing is an act of radical kindness and self-care. Learning to sew for yourself enables you to make exactly the kinds of clothes you want, and empowers you to solve the fit issues that come with buying commercial clothing designed to fit one'ideal'body type. Sanae Ishida, author of the award-winning Sewing Happiness, guides you through the process with her inspiring personal story and gentle instruction in the simple art of pattern-making and garment sewing. Create a complete capsule wardrobe of tops, bottoms, dresses, tunics, and outerwear. Each of the 15 projects (including variations) is designed to look good on a wide variety of body types—they're fashionable yet timeless, and let you move with ease. Every pattern is self-drafted (no printed pattern sheets here—you will learn to draft and customize basic shapes to your own body measurements for a comfortable fit). Patternmaking has never been easier than in this intuitive, fully illustrated book.Includes:Lookbook with photographs of the projects on diverse modelsPrimer on basic sewing, pattern drafting (slopers and muslins), and fittingStep-by-step illustrated instructions for all 15 projects and variationsHeartwarming personal essay on the author's journey to body positivity

Food is complicated. And our relationships with food and eating are all kinds of fucked up. It doesn't help that cultural messages about health, diet, body image, and weight are fatphobic and often medically dangerous. Dr. Faith Harper, author of the bestselling Unfuck Your Brain and Unfuck Your Body, brings her trademark combination of science, humor, and real talk to help us work through our food, health, and body image issues and develop a healthier relationship with food so that it can fuel us and bring us pleasure. She delves into the difference between eating disorders and disordered eating and the causes and consequences of both, breaks down the difference between various behaviors, tackles trauma and other co-occurring conditions, and provides compassionate and practical steps to improve your eating habits and repair your relationship with yourself.

A memoir of addiction, body image, and healing, through the lens of a long-distance runner. Emily Pifer's debut memoir, The Running Body, wrestles and reckons with power and agency, language and story, body dysphoria and beauty standards, desire and addiction, loss and healing. Pifer employs multiple modes of storytelling—memoir, meditation, and cultural analysis—interweaving research, argument, and experience as she describes how, during her time as a collegiate distance runner, she began to run more while eating less. Many around her, including her coaches, praised her for these practices. But as she became faster, and as her body began to resemble the bodies that she had seen across start-lines and on the covers of running magazines, her bones began to fracture. Pifer tells her story alongside the stories of her teammates, competitors, and others as they all face trouble regarding their bodies. Through the lens of long-distance running, Pifer examines the effects of idolization and obsession, revealing the porous boundaries between what counts as success and what is considered failure. While grounded in truth, The Running Body interrogates its relationship to magical thinking, the stories we tell ourselves, and the faultiness of memory. Fractures, figurative and literal, run through the narrative as Pifer explores the ways bodies become entangled in stories. The Running Body was selected by Steve Almond as the winner of the 2021 Autumn House Nonfiction Prize.

Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Memoir or Autobiography A New York Times Notable Book of 2022 • Vulture's #1 Memoir of 2022 • A Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, USA TODAY, Time, BuzzFeed, Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and New York Public Library Best Book of the Year • One of Oprah Daily's 33 Memoirs That Changed a Generation From Chloé Cooper Jones—Pulitzer Prize finalist, philosophy professor, Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grant recipient—an “exquisite” (Oprah Daily) and groundbreaking memoir about disability, motherhood, and the search for a new way of seeing and being seen.“I am in a bar in Brooklyn, listening to two men, my friends, discuss whether my life is worth living.” So begins Chloé Cooper Jones's bold, revealing account of moving through the world in a body that looks different than most. Jones learned early on to factor “pain calculations” into every plan, every situation. Born with a rare congenital condition called sacral agenesis which affects both her stature and gait, her pain is physical. But there is also the pain of being judged and pitied for her appearance, of being dismissed as “less than.” The way she has been seen—or not seen—has informed her lens on the world her entire life. She resisted this reality by excelling academically and retreating to “the neutral room in her mind” until it passed. But after unexpectedly becoming a mother (in violation of unspoken social taboos about the disabled body), something in her shifts, and Jones sets off on a journey across the globe, reclaiming the spaces she'd been denied, and denied herself. From the bars and domestic spaces of her life in Brooklyn to sculpture gardens in Rome; from film festivals in Utah to a Beyoncé concert in Milan; from a tennis tournament in California to the Killing Fields of Phnom Penh, Jones weaves memory, observation, experience, and aesthetic philosophy to probe the myths underlying our standards of beauty and desirability and interrogates her own complicity in upholding those myths. “Bold, honest, and superbly well-written” (Andre Aciman, author of Call Me By Your Name) Easy Beauty is the rare memoir that has the power to make you see the world, and your place in it, with new eyes.

Body schema is a system of sensory-motor capacities that function without awareness or the necessity of perceptual monitoring. Body image consists of a system of perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs pertaining to one's own body. In 2005 Shaun Gallagher published an influential book entitled How the Body Shapes the Mind (OUP). That book not only defined both body schema and body image, but explored the complicated relationship between the two. It also established the idea that there is a double dissociation, whereby body schema and body image refer to two different but closely related systems. Given that many kinds of pathological cases can be described in terms of body schema and body image (phantom limbs, asomatognosia, apraxia, schizophrenia, anorexia, depersonalization, and body dysmorphic disorder, among others), we might expect to find a growing consensus about these concepts and the relevant neural activities connected to these systems. Instead, an examination of the scientific literature reveals continued ambiguity and disagreement. This volume brings together leading experts from the fields of philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, and psychiatry in a lively and productive dialogue. It explores fundamental questions about the relationship between body schema and body image, and addresses ongoing debates about the role of the brain and the role of social and cultural factors in our understanding of embodiment.

Der Körper hat Symbolbedeutung in verschiedenen Bereichen der Psychopathologie. Über ihn können unbewältigte psychische Konflikte und Defizite, aber auch Traumafolgen und deren Abwehr mehr oder weniger symbolisch ausgedrückt werden. Unter diesem Aspekt betrachten die Beiträger•innen Themen wie Selbstverletzung und Essstörungen, beschreiben die Besonderheiten des therapeutischen Vorgehens bei wenig symbolisierten Körpersyndromen und untersuchen die Kommunikationsfunktion des Körpers in der analytischen Psychotherapie. Nichtsymbolisierte Körpersymptome in frühester Kindheit werden ebenso bearbeitet wie die Verbindung zu zeitgenössischen Formen der Körperkultur wie Tattoo und Piercing. Mit Blick auf die Geschichte der Psychoanalyse werden die Ursprünge der Symbolbedeutung des Körpers aufgespürt und ihre Weiterentwicklung nachvollzogen. Mit Beiträgen von Margarete Berger, Christel Böhme-Bloem, Mathias Hirsch, Gerhard Paar, Fernanda Pedrina, Reinhard Plassmann, Aglaja Stirn und Volker Trempler

'To eat is to build upon our collective story. We use food to say, again and again, who we are.'Eating with My Mouth Open is food writing like you've never seen before: honest, bold, and exceptionally tasty. Sam van Zweden's personal and cultural exploration of food, memory, and hunger revels in body positivity, dissects wellness culture and all its flaws, and shares the joys of being part of a family of chefs.Celebrating food and all the bodies it nurtures, Eating with My Mouth Open considers the true meaning of nourishment within the broken food system we live in. Not holding back from difficult conversations about mental illness, weight, and wellbeing, Sam van Zweden advocates for body politics that are empowering, productive, and meaningful.