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Annotated Bibliography

Why is it Wrong to be Fat in American Culture?

Misty Morin
Professor Malcolm Campbell
English 1103
10-17-18

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Annotated Bibliography
Farrell, Amy E. Fat Shame: Stigma and the Fat Body in American Culture. New York, NY: New
York University Press, 2011. Print.
Fatshame is the book I found on my second trip to the library and the inspiration that
helped me to steer away from too broad of a topic. While I have not had a chance to read
the book in its entirety, the abundance of information I have gained from what little I
have read and scanned is extremely encouraging. This book discusses topics such as
sensuality, obesity, feminism, culture, and racism, and how they relate to one another. The
book begins with a brief overview and then progresses into a short history and tells the
story of how fatness transformed from a symbol of wealth and power into the worst fear
of a society. It then discusses how the power structure is designed and why being fat
remains a tragedy to this day. A quote within the book that I found to be particularly
thought provoking was this: What is clear from the historical documents, however, is
that the connotations of fatness and of the fat person lazy, gluttonous, greedy, immoral,
uncontrolled, stupid, ugly, and lacking in will power preceded and then were
intertwined with explicit concern about health issues. Fatshame is targeted towards
individuals interested in learning about discrimination towards overweight people. Easy
to read word choice suggests that the author intended to educate anyone who happened
upon her book. I am immensely grateful that I found this source and I believe it will be
my most-cited out of all the materials I have gathered. Amy Farrell works at Dickinson
College for Womens and Gender Studies as well as American Studies. Her work in these
fields only further reassures me that this book contains only quality data. The book was
published in 2011 so this is also good news and confirms that the information found

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inside should be accurate and up to date. I definitely will be using this source in my EIP
paper.
Gapinski, Kathrine D, Kelly D. Brownell, and Marianne LaFrance. "Body Objectification and
Fat Talk: Effects on Emotion, Motivation, and Cognitive Performance Sex Roles. Sex
Roles. 48. Springer, May 2003. Web. 25 October 2015.
I found this peer-reviewed source through Atkins database. This essay provides specific
examples through multiple studies and research on how we as a culture think about the
body. For example, researchers gathered a group of junior high students (the time period
that males start preforming better at math than their female counterparts and the age that
females typically begin to be objectified) and instructed some students to wear swimsuits
while others donned sweaters. The students were then given a math exam. Results from
this experiment showed that females in bathing suits received lower marks than even the
males that were also in swimsuits. This article also addresses the objectification of the
body and the negative effects of fat talk, or, the self-disparaging body talk that occurs
in peer groups and appears to contain an element of social inuence. Basically this
means the casual use of phrases such as Im so fat in conversation reinforces the idea
that fatness is a bad trait and as a general rule thinness is a desired trait. I really enjoyed
this article because of the focus of the social aspect of body image and objectification.
Plenty of scientific studies were cited within this paper and the consequences of the
negative connotations associated with fatness were made clear. This source is more
scholarly and contains language and data that may be confusing to the average reader.
That being said, this source is probably meant for researchers and academic institutions to
use in comparing their own observations. Two of the three authors of this piece of

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literature are professors at Yale, and all three have doctorate degrees. This leads me to
believe that the information found in this paper is sound. While this source is slightly
older, the same ideas apply to modern times and I will be using it in my final paper.
Griffin, Morgan R., Micheal W. Smith. Obesity Epidemic Astronomical. Web MD. (n.d.) Web
MD. Web. 18 October 2015.
Web MD is a reliable internet database, and as such, my second source comes from this
website. For the most part this source takes on a different view point than the other pieces
of literature I have chosen to use. The article discusses the typical war on obesity and the
health risks associated with being over the recommended weight. It offers the simple
fixes of exercising more and eating healthier, while shaming fad diets and miracle pills.
Shifting cultural work environments from physical labor to office jobs is discussed and is
blamed for the recent weight gain in America. Unfortunately this article does not touch
on factors like poverty and their relation to obesity. However, it does mention the stigma
towards obesity, saying: The American public still views obesity as a cosmetic
problem we need to come up with a different way of talking about obesity that won't
make people feel stigmatized. I like this quote because it captures the Western mindset
of viewing fatness as a problem. Health-wise, yes, being overweight can put an individual
at risk for certain diseases, but so can smoking, which is often portrayed as cool in
modern media. More than likely the target audience of this piece is the general public.
The author of this article, R. Griffin, is a free-lance writer with an English degree who
often writes for health oriented publications, but has no professional medical experience.
This makes me question the validity of this article, but it has also been reviewed by
Doctor Micheal Smith, a well-known medical editor and established physician in

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Georgia. I will be using this source in my final paper as an example of modern media
trying to scare the public into becoming thin.
Neporent, Liz. "Stigma Against Fat People the Last Acceptable Prejudice, Studies Find." ABC
News. ABC News Network, 22 Jan. 2013. Web. 18 Oct. 2015.
This article tells the story of Kellie Tiggeman, one of countless overweight individuals
that face discrimination because of their size every day. While trying to board a
Southwest Airline flight Tiggeman was stopped twice and told that she was too fat to
fly. Southwest does have a policy regarding larger fliers, but unfortunately both
representatives Tiggeman dealt with were uninformed of the correct protocols. The article
also gives general information and statistical data. According to the article, studies show
that lean male judges are the most likely to harshly sentence larger women in court while
women judges had no biased leanings based on weight. It even gives examples of
discrimination in the workplace and in the doctors office. Twenty-four percent of nurses
polled said that they were repulsed by obese patients. There is no way these individuals
are receiving proper care if their providers are repulsed by who they are. The target
audience of this article is again the general public. Titling the article something shocking
and scandalous is an easy way to draw in viewers that are interested in the latest drama,
which is almost everyone. ABC news, the publisher of this article, is a popular source.
The author, Liz Neporent, is a seasoned writer, having produced more than 20 books and
has had her work displayed in modern publications, such as The New York Times. This
background, as well as her experience in exercise science and wellness, leads me to
believe that this source is extremely credible. I also like this source because it provides a
personal example of fat shaming as well as statistical analysis to back up these claims.

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Including this article in my paper will help me to use data from a variety of sources, so I
plan on citing this piece of work.