Final Exam: question #1

1) I think body image is an idea that an individual has about the way he or she presents their self and also how that individual thinks they are perceived by other people. Body image is what a person sees or thinks of when that person pictures their self. It is not only about looks. Body image is also affected by the feelings that a person has about their self and by their mood and mental state. Another contributor to body image is the feedback that a person receives from other individuals. If someone tells you that you are fat, you will probably think you are fat, unless you have a great deal of self confidence. And this will most likely make you picture yourself as fat after that. This will now be part of your body image.

Your mood can contribute to body image because I think your body image changes often. When you feel depressed or sluggish, you might have a more negative body image. When you are happy or energetic, you might have a more positive body image. Your body image also changes throughout your life course. When you are in young or maybe when you are in love you might tend to have a more positive body image of yourself. However, when you are older or when you do not have a romantic partner you might tend to have a more negative body image. What a negative or positive body image "looks like" depends on the individual and the culture.

There are many different ideas of what beauty is and these various ideas of beauty are what most people would like to aspire to. When people do not think they look like or act like the specific ideal beauty in their culture, this can put stress on that person. They might have a negative body image. It is not that they are wrong to look like they do, they just think it is wrong to look like they were born to look. It baffles me that we let other people tell us how we should and should not look. What is so bad about the way people were born to look? Who decides what is beautiful and why do they hold everyone to this ideal? This is very important to understand when discussing body image because it is influenced so much by what the beauty standards are in their culture. In the Body Outlaws text Amelia Richards states "we must take this opportunity to seize control of our bodies and the forces that manipulate them-mostly the advertising and entertainment industries."(p 199) This is where the beauty myth comes in.

Naomi Wolf describes the beauty myth as " a violent backlash against feminism that uses images of female beauty as a political weapon against women's advancement"(p 10). This basically means that society holds women to this standard of beauty in order to hold women back, or get back at them. For so long women have been oppressed, not able to vote or have the same jobs that men have. Now that we can do just about anything a man can, they are still trying to oppress us with this one thing, the beauty myth. The only reason this is successful is because it is so closely linked to our body image. When a woman is unhappy with or questions her body image, this affects her self esteem, which can effect other aspects of her life. With a negative body image comes low self esteem, and this can hinder women from being powerful and successful. Naomi Wolf states "recent research consistently shows that inside the majority of the West's controlled, attractive, successful working women, there is a secret "underlife" poisoning our freedom; infused with notions of beauty, it is a dark vein of self hatred, physical obsessions, terror of aging, and dread of lost control." (p 10) This is exactly how the beauty myth can effect a woman's body image in a negative way.

The discipline of Women's and Gender Studies intersects with body image and beauty culture because our history as women and the different waves of feminism seem to be what has caused the beauty myth and the beauty culture, and from this comes our body image. Naomi Wolf writes "as women released themselves from the feminine mystique of domesticity, the beauty myth took over its lost ground, expanding and waned to carry on its work of social control." (p 10)

I think the top three body image issues are 1) eating disorders like anorexia, bulimia, and overeating; 2) promiscuity; and lastly 3) abuse. The reason I chose eating disorders for number one is because they are so prevalent. I have read about eating disorders in each text that we read, and heard about it in just about every film that we watched. There was even a whole film about eating disorders that we watched in class. Amelia Richards says that she used to suffer from bulimia in the Body outlaws text (p 200). There was even a guest speaker who talked about eating disorders. Another reason I chose this topic is the severity of the problem. Eating disorders can severely damage your body or even result in death. Promiscuity was second on my list. Some might not think that this is a body image issue but it makes sense to me. When a woman or girl feels like she is not good enough whether it is physically or mentally sometimes she will make up for it by being promiscuous because sometimes sex is mistaken for love or approval. Lastly, I chose abuse. I think this is a problem when it comes to body image because women who have a more negative body image are more likely to let men abuse them because sometimes they have a distorted reality and they think they deserve it. Also, men who have a distorted view of body image might think it is okay to abuse women because they see their selves as being better than the women, or maybe they believe that the women deserve it. I think this is one of the biggest problems because of the consequences. Abuse can leave permanent mental scars on women and often times their children. Abuse can also lead to death.