Media and the rhetoric of body perfection
Subtitle: cosmetic surgery, weight loss and beauty in popular culture
By: by Deborah Harris-Moore
Series: The cultural politics of media and popular culture; Cultural politics of media and popular culture
Publisher: Ashgate
Published: 2014
Language: eng
Number of pages: 185
ISBN-13: 9781409469445; 9781409469452; 9781409469469
Subjects: Body Image; Chirurgie; Plastische Chirurgie; Schönheitsideal; Perfektionismus; Weight Loss; Beauty culture; Weight loss; Mass media; Social Psychology; Aspects sociaux; Féminisme; Femmes; Public Policy; Poids; PSYCHOLOGY; Human body; SOCIAL SCIENCE; Social aspects; Körperbild; Popular Culture; Massenmedien; Cultural Policy; Anthropology; Cultural; POLITICAL SCIENCE; Beauty Culture; Körperkultur; Physiologie; Human Body; Plastic Surgery
Description: Against the background of the so-called 'obesity epidemic', Media and the Rhetoric of Body Perfection critically examines the discourses of physical perfection that pervade Western societies, shedding new light on the rhetorical forces behind body anxieties and extreme methods of weight loss and beautification. Drawing on rich interview material with cosmetic surgery patients and offering fresh analyses of various texts from popular culture, including internationally-screened reality-television shows including The Biggest Loser, Extreme Makeover and The Swan as well as entertainment programmes and documentaries, this book examines the ways in which Western media capitalise on body anxiety by presenting physical perfection as a moral imperative, whilst advertising quick and effective transformation methods to erase physical imperfections. With attention to contemporary lines of resistance to standards of thinness and attempts to redefine conceptions of beauty, Media and the Rhetoric of Body Perfection will appeal to scholars and students of popular culture, television, media and cultural studies, as well as the sociology of the body, feminist thought, body transformation and cosmetic surgery.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.

Internet Archive - 2

Internet Archive 2
Table of contents: title: Survival of the fittest; title: Mass media and the perfection market; title: Reality television transformation; title: Fabricating fatness in cinema; title: Gaining and losing in real-life transformation; title: Resistant bodies and the politics of perfection.