The Body and the Reproduction of Femininity - Collin

In Susan Bordo’s article on The Gendered Body, it talks about how the male and female body is very much the same in nature, but how society chooses to gender the female body by labeling it. For example: eating disorders became characteristic of femininity because of the large increase in the numbers of women with eating disorders in the late 1900’s. It didn’t help that the scientists that were theorizing about the bodies were predominantly male as well. Susan Bordo goes on to explain the severity of how culturally defining femininity is effecting women both physically and emotionally. The constant demands of what is beautiful and how women look in the media are taken as “norms” and it feeds disorders such as Anorexia. The only way to end it is to not go with what culture says is right and to look beyond the boundaries and be proud of who you are because the second you don’t and you go looking for an answer elsewhere, you might end up in a much unhappier disposition.

I completely agree that history had definitely set a difficult course for women by creating definitions of femininity. There really isn’t a difference between the bodies, but movies and advertisements continue to create these characteristics that are “feminine.” The media is disgusting area by the way they discriminate against real people and always display people that have to go through great lengths of having to malnourish their selves to be acceptable. I do think that the only way to rise above it is not to accept it as the image we want to define ourselves, and to have the confidence and strength to be the image we want to see. Women and men should not force themselves into looking a certain way or be unhappy with the way they look.

Citation: Bordo, Susan. "The Body and the Reproduction of Femininity." Unbearable weight feminism, Western culture, and the body. Berkeley: University of California, 1993. Print.