30
June 2017
University
of York, UK
In 1978 Susie Orbach
declared fat a feminist issue. This slim volume of writing put forward a
radical new understanding of feminine embodiment and the gendered psychology of
eating. Taking place almost four decades later, this one-day conference will
revisit the terrain explored by Orbach and open out new themes of analysis by
examining contemporary feminist perspectives on food. Of particular concern are
the ways in which food cultures intersect with or map onto broader social
rationalities and political programmatics. These issues have been productively
pursued in recent analyses of the shift in dieting discourse from a concern
with weight to a preoccupation with health (Cairns & Johnston, 2015),
alongside the turn to interiority as part of a more general revaluation of domesticity
(Dejmanee, 2015). Yet there remains further work to be done here, particularly
in light of changing patterns in the cultural landscape of postfeminism (Gill,
2016; McRobbie, 2015).
This event will bring
together scholars from across a range of disciplinary locations — sociology,
psychology, media and cultural studies, geography and social policy – to
address questions such as: What does the continued stigmatisation of fatness
and the heightened stylisation of fitness suggest about contemporary formations
of femininity? How do new kinds of cultural intermediaries feed existing moral economies
of consumer-citizenship? How can we understand the ubiquity of food-related
content on social media? What does it mean for food
to be so heavily mediated, and what role does media play in stimulating,
curtailing, or managing appetites? How can feminist scholarship resist the
tendency to moralise dietary practices while addressing inequalities
and violences? How do we complicate logics of personal responsibility even as
we strive for environmental sustainability? What
might a feminist politics of food look like, and what kinds of tools and resources
are needed for this?
We are pleased to
confirm that Susie Orbach will open the conference with a keynote address. A
round table featuring several leading feminist scholars will conclude the day’s
discussions (full list of speakers to be confirmed).
Papers are invited
on themes including but not limited to:
- Food work
- Aesthetic labour and
beauty politics
- Corporeality and
digital culture
- Healthism and the
medicalisation of everyday life
- Consumption and
entrepreneurship
- Bodies of
knowledge and knowledge politics
- Dietary regimes
and exceptional foodstuffs: ‘5: 2’, ‘clean’, ‘paleo’, ‘superfoods’
- Metrics,
quantification, algorithms, apps
- ‘Fitness’ as
cultural idiom
- Narcissism and
sexual politics
- The economics and
politics of austerity
- Hunger
Please also include
a short biographical note (50-100 words) with details of main research
interests and current academic affiliation, if any.
Deadline for submissions:
14 April 2017
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