Body Battlegrounds: Transgressions, Tensions, and Transformations

273 Pages·2019·2.611 MB·English

by  Chris Bobel and Samantha Kwan (eds.)

B O D Y
B AT T L E G R O U N D S
TRANSGRESSIONS, TENSIONS,
AND TRANSFORMATIONS

EDITED BY CHRIS BOBEL AND SAMANTHA KWAN
Body Battlegrounds

Body Battlegrounds
Transgressions, Tensions,
and Transformations
Edited by Chris Bobel
and Samantha Kwan
Vanderbilt University Press
Nashville
© 2019 by Vanderbilt University Press
Nashville, Tennessee 37235
All rights reserved
First printing 2019
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Bobel, Chris, 1963– editor. | Kwan, Samantha, 1971– editor.
Title: Body battlegrounds: transgressions, tensions, and transformations /
edited by Chris Bobel and Samantha Kwan.
Description: Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press, [2019] | Includes
bibliographical references and index. |
Identifiers: LCCN 2018027236 (print) | LCCN 2018044292 (ebook) | ISBN
9780826522351 (ebook) | ISBN 9780826522337 (cloth: alk. paper) | ISBN
9780826522344 (pbk.: alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Human body—Social aspects. | Manners and customs. |
Women—Psychology. | Sexual minorities—Psychology.
Classification: LCC HM636 (ebook) | LCC HM636.B5837 2019 (print) | DDC
306.4/613—dc23
LC record available at lccn.loc.gov/2018027236
ISBN 978-0-8265-2233-7 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-0-8265-2234-4 (paperback)
ISBN 978-0-8265-2235-1 (ebook)
For Leela, Jan, Matthew, James, Lucy, Saartje, Fiona,
Francecca, Nabra, Rick, and Tilly

Contents
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
Chris Bobel and Samantha Kwan
Part I:
Going “Natural”
1 Body Hair Battlegrounds: The Consequences,
Reverberations, and Promises of Women
Growing Their Leg, Pubic, and Underarm Hair 11
Breanne Fahs
2 Radical Doulas, Childbirth Activism,
and the Politics of Embodiment 23
Monica Basile
3 Caring for the Corpse: Embodied Transgression
and Transformation in Home Funeral Advocacy 38
Anne Esacove
LIVING RESISTANCE
Deconstructing Reconstructing: Challenging
Medical Advice Following Mastectomy 50
Joanna Rankin
LIVING RESISTANCE
My Ten-Year Dreadlock Journey:
Why I Love the “Kink” in My Hair…Today 54
Cheryl Thompson
LIVING RESISTANCE
Living My Full Life: Rejecting Weight Loss
as an Imperative for Recovery from
Binge Eating Disorder 56
Christina Fisanick
viii Body Battlegrounds
LIVING RESISTANCE
Pretty Brown: Encounters with My Skin Color 58
Praveena Lakshmanan
Part II:
Representing Resistance
4 Blood as Resistance: Photography
as Contemporary Menstrual Activism 63
Shayda Kafai
5 Am I Pretty Enough for You Yet?:
Resistance through Parody in the Pretty
or Ugly YouTube Trend 76
Katherine Phelps
6 The Infidel in the Mirror: Mormon
Women’s Oppositional Embodiment 88
Kelly Grove and Doug Schrock
LIVING RESISTANCE
A Cystor’s Story: Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome
and the Disruption of Normative Femininity 101
Ledah McKellar
LIVING RESISTANCE
Old Bags Take a Stand: A Face Off with Ageism
in America 104
Faith Baum and Lori Petchers
LIVING RESISTANCE
Making Up with My Body: Applying Cosmetics
to Resist Disembodiment 107
Haley Gentile
LIVING RESISTANCE
I Am a Person Now: Autism, Indistinguishability,
and (Non)optimal Outcome 110
Alyssa Hillary
Part III:
Creating Community, Disrupting Assumptions
7 Yelling and Pushing on the Bus:
The Complexity of Black Girls’ Resistance 117
Stephanie D. Sears and Maxine Leeds Craig
Contents ix
8 Big Gay Men’s Performative Protest against
Body Shaming: The Case of Girth and Mirth 129
Jason Whitesel
9 “What’s Love Got to Do with It?”:
The Embodied Activism of Domestic Violence
Survivors on Welfare 144
Sheila M. Katz
LIVING RESISTANCE
“Your Signing Is So Beautiful!”: The Radical
Invisibility of ASL Interpreters in Public 160
Rachel Kolb
LIVING RESISTANCE
Two Shakes 163
Rev. Adam Lawrence Dyer
LIVING RESISTANCE
“Showing Our Muslim”: Embracing the Hijab
in the Era of Paradox 165
Sara Rehman
LIVING RESISTANCE
“Doing Out”: A Black Dandy Defies
Gender Norms in the Bronx 168
Mark Broomfield
LIVING RESISTANCE
Everybody: Making Fat Radio for All of Us 171
Cat Pausé
Part IV:
Transforming Institutions and Ideologies
10 Embodying Nonexistence: Encountering
Mono- and Cisnormativities in Everyday Life 177
J. E. Sumerau
11 Freeing the Nipple: Encoding the Heterosexual
Male Gaze into Law 189
J. Shoshanna Ehrlich
12 Give Us a Twirl: Male Baton Twirlers’
Embodied Resistance in a Feminized Terrain 200
Trenton M. Haltom