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Loading... Fasting Girls: The History of Anorexia Nervosaby Joan Jacobs Brumberg
Penguin Random House (246) Loading...
Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. excellent history on anorexia and the attition starving got through the ages. ( ) This book was relatively easy to read; however, it did have a few slow points. If there was more of an environment/era overview focus rather than a few specific era case studies, I think the book would have flowed better and the slow points would have been nearly eliminated. After reading this book, I am left with the perception - perhaps gross misinterpretation - that anorexia, in all its forms, is nothing more than a means for attention. Saintly attention; romantic attention; jealous attention; political attention - attention all the same. (Respectfully, this perception is not meant to demean or lessen the tribulations of anorexia.) This is a historian's look at Anorexia and it's rise since victorian times. Interesting in how it looks at body image and how it's changed over the years combined with how the attitude of many of the people involved has changed. Disturbing in many ways it's an indictment in how divorced from reality our perception of fat and body image has become. no reviews | add a review
Winner of four major awards, this updated edition of Joan Jacobs Brumberg's Fasting Girls, presents a history of women's food-refusal dating back as far as the sixteenth century. Here is a tableau of female self-denial: medieval martyrs who used starvation to demonstrate religious devotion, "wonders of science" whose families capitalized on their ability to survive on flower petals and air, silent screen stars whose strict "slimming" regimens inspired a generation. Here, too, is a fascinating look at how the cultural ramifications of the Industrial Revolution produced a disorder that continues to render privileged young women helpless. Incisive, compassionate, illuminating, Fasting Girls offers real understanding to victims and their families, clinicians, and all women who are interested in the origins and future of this complex, modern and characteristically female disease. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)616.85262Technology Medicine and health Diseases Diseases of nervous system and mental disorders Miscellaneous NeurosesLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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