WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES OF EMBODIED JOY: RESISTING THE CULTURAL DICTATE OF BODILY DISSATISFACTION
by
Elyse Michelle Peasley
A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development Ontario Institute for Studies in Education University of Toronto
© Copyright by Elyse Michelle Peasley 2013
WOMEN’S EXPERIENCES OF EMBODIED JOY: RESISTING THE CULTURAL DICTATE OF BODILY DISSATISFACTION Doctor of Philosophy 2013 Elyse Michelle Peasley Graduate Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development University of Toronto
Abstract
Among women in North America, body dissatisfaction is prevalent and well documented. Women are often unhappy with their bodies and strive to change their bodies to fit the dominant cultural ideal of beauty and femininity. Within this context, in which women are expected to focus tremendous resources, time, and energy on bodily striving and body dissatisfaction, some women are able to resist these expectations. They experience joy with their bodies—joy that is not contingent on their appearance, size, or weight. With respect to women’s embodied experiences of joy, a number of significant gaps exist in the research literature. The current study examined women’s experiences of embodied joy through the use of qualitative research methods, including individual interviews and a focus group. A feminist constructivist grounded theory frame was utilized. The findings of this analysis indicated the presence of four core dimensions of women’s joyful body experiences as a form of resistance to bodily dissatisfaction. The first core dimension addressed the experience of embodied joy, which included attunement, growth, liberation, and thriving. The second core dimension addressed participants’ active creation of environments that nurtured joy, including: creating spaces that facilitated embodied joy, creating internal openness to the experience of joy, and seeking supportive social relationships. The third core dimension addressed enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle, specifically when navigating the imposition of the other’s external gaze. This core dimension included the themes of media deconstruction, disengagement from problematic relationships, personal practices of resistance, and critical political ii
consciousness. The fourth core dimension involved enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle as a journey towards joy, which included reclaimed childhood experiences, disruption and reconnection, and guiding other girls and women. The present study has implications for clinical work as well as for health promotion. Ultimately, women’s experiences of embodied joy both reflected their resistance to cultural dictates and further enabled them to resist the dictate of bodily dissatisfaction.
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Through perseverance. With gratitude.
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Nolite te bastardes carborundorum. ~ Margaret Atwood, The handmaid’s tale
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Table of Contents Abstract List of Figures List of Appendices
ii x xi
Introduction
1
Chapter 1 - Literature Review
5
1.1. Concept of the Body 1.1.1. Social Construction of the body 1.1.2. Embodiment
5 5 7
1.2. Constructs of Femininity 1.2.1. Expectations and bodily practices involved in femininity 1.2.2. Fatness and thinness 1.2.3. Changes over time
8 10 11 16
1.3. Women’s Body Dissatisfaction 1.3.1. Problems with the goal of bodily control 1.3.1.1. Objectification and internalization 1.3.2. Shifts in adolescence 1.3.3. Intersectionality 1.3.4. Relationship to eating disorders
18 22 22 25 27 29
1.4. Maintenance of Social Control Through Women’s Body Dissatisfaction 1.4.1. Appetite as danger because women are too much 1.4.2. The role of media 1.4.3. Rewards for adhering the beauty myth and the threat in challenging it
30 32 34
1.5. Resistance 1.5.1. Specific bodily practices of resistance 1.5.2. Already occurring oppositional discourses 1.5.2.1. Groups designed to foster resistance 1.5.2.2. Health at Every Size
37 40 44 45 46
1.6. The Construct of Joy 1.6.1. Research on women’s experiences of embodied joy
49 53
1.7. Rationale for the Current Study
54
Chapter 2 – Methodology
36
58
2.1. Feminist Research Methods 2.1.1. Indigenous feminism and critical race feminism. vi
58 62
2.2. Constructivist Grounded Theory 2.2.1. Relevance of a feminist-constructivist-grounded theory frame to the current study
67
2.3. Modes of Inquiry 2.3.1. Individual interview 2.3.2. The focus group 2.3.2.1. Fat talk and positive body talk 2.3.3. The benefits of using multiple methods
70 70 71 73 74
2.4. Participants 2.4.1. Narrative description of the social location of each individual participant
77
2.5 Procedure 2.5.1. Recruitment and orientation 2.5.2. The interview 2.5.3. The focus group 2.5.4. Renumeration
84 84 85 88 90
2.6. Data Analysis 2.6.1. Researcher’s reflexivity
90 92
Chapter Three - Experiences of Joy in the Body
66
80
96
3.1. Attunement 3.1.1. Mind-body harmony 3.1.2. Trusting oneself in the moment
97 97 101
3.2. Growth
106
3.3. Liberation 3.3.1. Celebration 3.3.2. Freedom of movement 3.2.3. Independence
110 111 113 115
3.4. Thriving 3.4.1. Empowerment 3.4.2. Congruity
118 118 120
Chapter Four - Creating Environments that Nurture Joy 4.1. Space for Myself 4.1.1. Safe space 4.1.2. Frequent diversified engagement 4.1.3. The natural world vii
123 124 124 130 133
4.2. Internal Environments 4.2.1. Reading the body 4.2.2. Personal meaning 4.2.3. Choice
135 135 140 142
4.3. Social Relationships 4.3.1. Supportive relationships 4.3.2. Role models
143 144 147
Chapter Five - Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze
153
5.1. Media Deconstruction
154
5.2. Disengagement from Problematic Relationships 5.2.1. Parental judgment 5.2.2. Others’ diet talk
161 162 168
5.3. Personal Practices 5.3.1. Living in the body 5.3.2. Body weight and size 5.3.3. Appearance and beauty practices
172 173 177 186
5.4 Critical Political Consciousness 5.4.1. Embracing alternative values 5.4.2. Communities of resistance and joy
193 193 199
Chapter Six - Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy 6.1. Reclaimed Childhood Experiences 6.2. Disruption and Reconnection 6.3. Guiding Other Girls and Women
205 205 209 215
Chapter Seven – Discussion
220
7.1. The Multidimensional Nature of Joyful Body Experiences 7.1.1. Experiences of joy in the body 7.1.2. Creating environments that nurture joy 7.1.3. Enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle: Navigating the imposition of others’ external gaze 7.1.4. Enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle: Journey to joy
242
7.2. Strengths and Limitations 7.2.1. Strengths of the present study
244 244
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220 225 229 233
7.2.2. Limitations of the present study
246
7.3. Suggestions for Future Research
248
7.4. Clinical and Health Promotion Implications
250
7.5. Concluding Questions
254
References
255
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List of Figures Figure 1.
Themes within the core dimension of Experiences of Joy in the Body
96
Figure 2.
Sub-themes within the theme of Attunement
97
Figure 3.
Sub-themes within the theme of Liberation
110
Figure 4.
Sub-themes within the theme of Thriving
118
Figure 5.
Themes within the core dimension of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy
123
Figure 6.
Sub-themes within the theme of Space for Myself
124
Figure 7.
Sub-themes within the theme of Internal Environments
135
Figure 8.
Sub-themes within the theme of Social Relationships
144
Figure 9.
Primary Themes within the core dimension of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others External Gaze
154
Sub-themes within the theme of Disengagement from Problematic Relationships
162
Figure 11.
Sub-themes within the theme Personal Practices
172
Figure 12.
Sub-themes within the theme of Critical Political Consciousness
193
Figure 13.
Themes within the core dimension of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy
205
Figure 10.
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Appendices Appendix A – Individual Interview Protocol
270
Appendix B – Demographic Questionnaire
272
Appendix C – Information and Recruitment Letter
273
Appendix D – Interview Consent Letter
274
Appendix E – Focus Group Consent Letter
277
Appendix F – Request for Information Form
280
Appendix G – Focus Group Protocol
281
Appendix H – Specific Activities that Women Experienced as Joyful
282
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Introduction Among women in North America, body dissatisfaction is prevalent and well documented. Women are often unhappy with their bodies and strive to change their bodies to fit the dominant cultural ideal of beauty through a relentless pursuit of thinness (Szekely, 1988). However, some women are able to resist this dictate. They are able to experience joy in their bodies, joy that is not contingent on their appearance, size, or weight. The body and embodiment may be understood as a “point of overlapping between the physical, the symbolic, and the sociological” (Braidotti, 1994, p. 5). Notably, embodiment is a situated position “from which to engage with human experience in lived, and therefore less objectifying terms” (Inckle, 2007, p. 87). Constructions of femininity in western culture are based in a notion of bodily deficiency and female perfection (Wolf, 1991). Femininity can be understood as a culture and gender statement of the values of a given period in time. Body ideals shift across time, across ethnic groups, across class, and across cultures (Frieden, 1963; Urla & Swedlund, 2000). Constructions and expectations of femininity have been critiqued; however, the expectations of femininity need not be realistic or easily achievable by women in order for them to be imposed upon women’s bodies (Braidotti, 1994). In the western world, women’s bodies are considered to be deficient and must be produced as beautiful. A woman’s most important identity is as a body—an inferior body, but a body which still must be altered by being plucked, slimmed, and firmed. This is a form of psychological oppression that attacks a woman’s personhood; it dehumanizes and depersonalizes women (Bartky, 1990). Women’s bodily unhappiness serves the political purpose of maintaining women’s attention on seeking power over the body, rather then shifting attention towards routes to actual power. The expectation of body dissatisfaction creates a cycle in which the individual woman’s
1
2 focus on her body is both normative—as the majority of women focus on bodily constriction through dieting—and is also seen as a sign of individual pathology. North American society is obsessed with keeping women’s bodies slim, tight, and young (Bordo, 1988). According to Bartky (1988), under this “tyranny of slenderness” (Chernin, 1981, p. xix), women must take up as little space as possible. Women strive to shape their bodies to suit an ideal; there is a great discrepancy between this ideal weight and the weights of the majority of actual women (Pipher, 1994). There is ample research evidence to support the proposition that encouraging individuals to reduce their body size through behavioural changes, including dieting and exercise, results in short term weight loss that is not maintained over a long term (Bacon & Aphramor, 2011). Additionally, this weight loss represents a conflation of health and appearance norms and does, not achieve the putative benefits of improved morbidity and mortality. Concern has arisen that this weight focus is not only ineffective at producing thinner, healthier bodies, but may also have unintended consequences, contributing to food and body preoccupation, repeated cycles of weight loss and regain, distraction from other personal health goals and wider health determinants, reduced self-esteem, eating disorders, other health decrement, and weight stigmatization and discrimination. (Bacon & Aphramor, 2011, Abstract). Problematically, women are currently culturally conditioned to hate their bodies, “which are after all themselves” (Pipher, 1994, p. 184). The unattainable body standard is presented as normal, which makes the “normative negative body experiences of women understandable” (McKinley, 2002, p. 56). The expectation of body dissatisfaction is a fundamental aspect of femininity in the western world, and bodily constriction through dieting is pervasive. However, though there are both cultural and personal implications to rejecting these expectations, some women are able to resist the expectation of body dissatisfaction (Davis, 1997; Szekely, 1988). Within this context, in which women are expected to focus tremendous resources, time, and energy on bodily striving and body dissatisfaction, some women are able to experience their
3 bodies as pleasurable and joyful, are able to resist and reject the dominant culture’s script around body hatred, and instead are able to love and enjoy their bodies in a way that is not contingent on their appearance. A sense of agency and subversion is essential for women’s actual lived body experiences; this subversion has been obscured in some ways by a research focus on the expectation of women’s body dissatisfaction, which tends to leave out women’s active role in interacting with their bodies (Davis, 1997). Individuals may play active roles in resisting this bodily oppression. Whereby women have “ongoingly negotiated the possibilities and limitations of their embodied experience, the body emerges as a site for mundane acts of resistance and rebellion” (Davis, 1997, p. 12). Women have the capacity to, and do, negotiate their embodied experience, and they may resist the dominant body culture in a myriad of ways. Indeed, though the broader context must be altered, individual women may gain insight into how to counteract the dominant cultural oppression of women, as well as learning individual strategies for resistance (McKinley, 2002; Wolf, 1991). Resistance is often condemned by culture, and by individuals within that culture who serve to buttress the status quo. However, according to Freire (2003, p. 54), it is “always through action in depth that the culture of domination is confronted.” Given that women’s bodies are central to their sense of agency, a primary goal is for women to repossess their bodies (Rich, 1976; Weiss & Haber, 1999). It is challenging to stand apart from the broader cultural norm, and particularly challenging when there are few role models for attending to one’s bodily needs without the associative goal of thinness (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Within these constraints, embodied joyful experiences present the potential for spaces of resistance. With respect to women’s embodied experiences of joy, a number of significant gaps exist in the research literature. Examinations of women’s resistance to body dissatisfaction norms are
4 generally limited to theory and to studies of body image. Studies that address women’s embodied experiences of resistance are lacking. Psychological literature tends to focus on negative experiences and pathology, and thus there exists a gap in the psychological literature with regards to positive experiences and positive emotions, particularly joy (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006; Dick-Niederhauser, 2009; Fredrickson, 2006; Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). There has certainly been no single study that explored joy with regards to the experience itself as well as addressing environments that support joy, the resistance involved in attaining joy, and the journey to joyful experiences. Additionally, no studies were found that explored women’s experiences of joy as a form of resistance to norms of bodily dissatisfaction. The current study seeks to examine women’s experiences of embodied joy from within a socio-cultural context, using a feminist framework and a qualitative research approach. Through interviews, participants engaged in a dialogical process that encouraged both a critical analysis of their social reality as it related to their relationships with their bodies, and a reflection on the feelings of joy experienced living as an embodied self. If they so chose, they also engaged in a focus group with other participants. The focus group was designed for research purposes, and also to provide an opportunity for positive body talk among the participants. The purpose of the present study is to expand current understandings of the ways in which individual women are able to resist and negate the cultural script of body dissatisfaction through engagement in embodied joyful experiences, while recognizing that this negation must also occur at broader societal levels.
Chapter One - Literature Review This literature review addresses current research and feminist understandings of women’s bodily experiences. First, I define the terms that are used in the current study, including the language of body image and embodiment. I then briefly discuss the ways in which women’s bodies are constructed by our culture, specifically addressing expectations regarding femininity. Following that, I outline some of the current knowledge regarding body dissatisfaction and the ways in which body dissatisfaction serves to maintain social control of women, simultaneously addressing the gendered nature of body dissatisfaction and utilizing social constructionist and feminist theory to understand how culture impacts women’s bodies and body experiences. Finally, I explore the research and theory on resistance to the social and cultural pressures towards body dissatisfaction and control behaviours, while also defining the concept of joy as it relates to the current research study. The literature review concludes with a rationale for the current study. 1.1. Concept of the Body The Concept of the Body section outlines body-based terminology used in this study, as well as cultural constructions of the meaning of the body. 1.1.1. Social Construction of the Body. The social constructionist position, which is often held by feminists, maintains that there is no such thing as a “’natural’ body” (Bordo, 1988, p. 90). The body is positioned within society and therefore even the concrete, physical body can only be understood within its historical and social context (Bordo, 1988; Szekely, 1988). The social construction model fits feminist conceptualizations of women’s body issues because it stresses social context, rather than individual pathology (McKinley, 2002). This position is also held by post-structuralist feminist theorists (Weedon, 1997). 5
6 Several feminist theorists have utilized Foucault’s writings about the body to explain the relationship between the female body and cultural structures of power (Foucault, 1979). In line with Foucault’s perspective, bodily possibilities, practices, and pleasures are defined by societies. In turn, social practices—such as a corseting—can change “peoples experience of their bodies and their possibilities” (Bordo, 1988, p. 91), including pain or desire (Birke, 1999; Diprose, 1994). While Birke (1999) has emphasized a view of biological bodies as material, she also suggested that material bodies transform and change in a dialogical relationship with the environment. For the purposes of the current study, Braidotti’s (1994) conceptualization of embodiment and sexual difference in contemporary feminist theory will be the primary framework: The body, or the embodiment, of the subject is to be understood as neither a biological nor a sociological category but rather as a point of overlapping between the physical, the symbolic, and the sociological… in other words, feminist emphasis on embodiment goes hand in hand with a radical rejection of essentialism. In feminist theory one speaks as a woman, although the subject “woman” is not a monolithic essence defined once and for all but rather the site of multiple, complex, and potentially contradictory sets of experiences, defined by overlapping lifestyle, sexual preference, and others… one speaks as a woman in order to empower women to activate socio-symbolic changes in their condition. (p. 5) Descartes’ dualistic epistemology has also shaped the way the body has been conceived in western science. He posited that with regards to human existence, the mental and spiritual world of the mind was separate from the world of matter and bodies, and that knowledge of these topics required one to remove oneself from both through the process of objectivity (Bordo, 1988; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). In this hierarchical construction, the mind is separate from, and superior to, the body. Further, consciousness is involved in controlling nature and bodies (Bordo, 1988; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). In this conceptualization of mind and body as a duality, women have been linked to the body, which is considered inferior and includes the experiences
7 of desire and appetite, while men have been linked to disembodied, rational, mental thought, which is considered superior and able to transcend nature and desire (Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998; Lorentzen, 2008; McKinley, 2002). Feminist theorists have challenged this hierarchical dualistic construction and, instead, posited the female body as an important site of knowledge (Bordo, 1989; Jaggar & Bordo, 1989). 1.1.2. Embodiment. The language of body image is overly simplistic, given that the organization of body experience is multidimensional (Fisher, 1986). It is questionable as to whether much of the research on body image—measuring, for example, accuracy in expressing body size—actually reflects positive body experiences (Kennedy, 1994; Piran & Teall, 2012). Body experiences require a subjective rather than an objective stance, given that women’s experiences are “lived and felt in the flesh” (Young, 2005, p. 7). Young (2005) therefore suggests that more work needs to be done to theorize embodiment as lived, as a “mode of being-in-the-world” (p. 7). Theorizing and research on the body frequently involves subject matter separate from and observed by others, as opposed to an embodied stance which incorporates “corporeal aspects of agency…and focus on the sensuous nature of human perception, emotion and desire, and the corporeal basis of agency, communication and thought” (Crossley, 2001, p. 3). It is problematic when the body is represented as passive, because when this occurs, embodied agency, the embodiment of personhood, and the centrality of emotion to embodiment are neglected (Lyons & Barbalet, 1994). Notably, “Embodiment is not, then, solely a theoretical reference point, but it is also a position from which to engage with human experience in lived, and therefore less objectifying terms” (Inckle, 2007, p. 87). The shift from the distance of the body to the intimacy of my body involves a reconstruction of how researchers conceptualize bodies, given that, as Van Den Berg (1952) implied and Merleau-Ponty (1945) noted, “we are our body” (p. 239).
8 Merleau-Ponty’s (1945) phenomenology theorized consciousness as embodied. The experience of subjective embodiment is in a dialogical relationship with the social and political world: “The body as lived is always layered with social and historical meaning and is not some private matter prior to or underlying economic and political relations or cultural meanings” (Young, 2005, p. 7). Embodied experiences are therefore related to one’s gender, social class, sexual orientation, physical ability, ethnic heritage, and other aspects of social location (Weiss & Haber, 1999; Young, 2005). From the perspective of feminist epistemology, given the argument that the female body is at the centre of practical patriarchal control, feminist writers have advocated for the study of female embodiment and, in particular, embodied practices. Such exploration expands our understanding of the subjectivities of the relationship between body and culture, and the subjectivities of women of diverse backgrounds inhabiting the body (Blood, 2005; Bordo, 1997; Piran & Teall, 2012). 1.2. Constructs of Femininity Femininity can be defined as “normatively disciplined expectations imposed on female bodies by male dominated society” (Young, 2005, p. 5). The gendered social conventions that comprise femininity are problematically and ambiguously related; however, social structures and experiences make them difficult to see (Young, 2005). These conventions involve the literal inscriptions upon women’s bodies of the rules concerning contemporary femininity (Bordo, 1997; Szekely, 1988). Constructions of femininity, and the expectation that women conform to these constructions, can be understood to relate to the inferior position of women on the axis of power, reflecting a fear of women being perceived as powerful, or too much, whereas contemporary beauty ideals are inevitably free of women’s actual power (Bordo, 1988). In her ground breaking work on this issue entitled The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf (1991) described the ways in which western women are controlled by ideals of female perfection,
9 whereby constructions of femininity in western culture are based in a notion of bodily deficiency. Constructions and expectations of femininity have been critiqued as having little to do with actual women’s lives and bodies; however, the expectations of femininity need not be realistic or easily achievable by women in order for them to be imposed on women’s bodies (Braidotti, 1994). It is crucial to view the construction of femininity as a myth which women are socialized to believe, and are subsequently held to. Ultimately, constructs of femininity entail women being controlled, spending time and energy feeling that they do not measure up, seeking the attention of men, and becoming objectified brass rings, all while censoring the truths of their own lives (Wolf, 1991). Femininity is often constructed as mutually exclusive from masculinity, which is a challenge when feminine ideals intersect with masculine values. These contradictory demands can be difficult to negotiate (Bordo, 1997). For example, diet and exercise regimes require what are often seen as male traits of will and mastery. The mystification involved in women’s adherence to prescribed norms of femininity require women to deny the effort involved in attempting to attain those goals. This dichotomy is reflected in ideals of male beauty. Men are given more cultural latitude with regards to their appetite and body size than women, and the male ideal more closely resembles typical male bodies (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Rodin, Silberstein, & Striegel-Moore, 1985). Men and women have very different modes of perceiving their bodies; they organize bodily experiences differently in terms of the attitudes and meaning assigned to those experiences. There are also many sex and gender differences with regards to one’s feelings about their body, and the basic ways those feelings impact upon identity (Fisher, 1986).
10 1.2.1. Expectations and Bodily Practices Involved in Femininity. Expectations regarding femininity are both symbolic and literal (Bordo, 1997). Women are expected to feed others and not themselves; any desire for self-nurturance is considered selfish, and feeding oneself is considered to be greedy and excessive. Women are meant to be other-oriented. In this way, female hunger for public power, independence, and sexual gratification is contained (Bordo, 1997). Traditional concepts of femininity—for example, the dichotomization of women into mother or whore archetypes—work with new images and ideals of female independence to produce “paradoxical habitats for women” (Diprose, 1994, p. 27), which are filled with contradictions, reproduce sexual differences, and are psychologically debilitating (Diprose, 1994). The ideal presentations of femininity for women are not threatening or sexual, but rather are examples of perfection; women may be idealized as domestic, ministering angels, and are compelled to attempt to fit these unrealistic ideals (Bordo, 1988). Bepko and Krestan (1990) outlined the primary rules of femininity, which guide women’s behaviour and emotions. The rules were: being attractive, being unselfish and of service, being a lady/in control, making relationships work, and being competent without complaint. All of these rules intersect, with a primary focus on the importance of being good (Bepko & Krestan, 1990; Szekely, 1988). These expectations regarding women’s behaviour are culturally specific to White, upper-middle class western values (Szekely, 1988; Thompson, 1994). These cultural expectations create ways of life and habits for women, and are constituted by cultural discourses and practices. However, there are slippages, and cultural expectations do not exclusively determine women’s experiences (Diprose, 1994). Additionally, there is hope that feminist constructions, though critiques of social discourses, have the potential to allow women and men to reconstitute themselves through changes in their habits from within the culture;
11 through producing new ways of life and relations with others, thus opening up other possibilities (Diprose, 1994). The rules for femininity are often translated through standard visual images: Women learn through bodily discourse the specific clothes, body shape, facial expressions, movements, and behaviours that are required by femininity (Bordo, 1997). These expectations require women to be more restricted than men in terms of the physical space they take up, and to avoid violating the norms of constriction so as not to be considered a loose woman who engages in free and easy movement (Bartky, 1988). Women’s faces tend to be deferential, and they are expected to smile more, as well as use cosmetics. The expectation that women wear makeup presupposes that a woman’s face is defective (Bartky, 1988); “few women have a strong sense of bodily identity, and the beauty myth urges us to see a ‘beautiful’ mask as preferable to our own faces and bodies” (Wolf, 1991, p. 126). Indeed, “the woman unable to leave home in the morning without ‘putting on her face’ will never discover the beauty, character, and expressiveness her own face already possesses” (Bartky, 1990, p. 42). Women’s breasts are primary and fetishized, and as with most norms of femininity, the normal and ideal breast is not representative of what actual women’s breasts tend to look like; breasts require clothing, in the form of brassieres, or surgery, to achieve these standards (Young, 2005). Constructing women’s bodies as deficient and inferior comprises a form of psychological oppression that attacks a woman’s personhood and dehumanizes and depersonalizes women, and hence also promotes gender inequity (Bartky, 1990). 1.2.2. Fatness and Thinness. North American society is virtually obsessed with keeping women’s bodies slim, tight and young (Bordo, 1988). The dictate of thinness is linked to femininity and youthfulness, as Bartky (1988) suggests:
12 Under the current “tyranny of slenderness” women are forbidden to become large or massive; they must take up as little space as possible. The very contours a woman’s body takes on as she matures—the fuller breasts and rounded hips— have become distasteful. The body by which a woman feels herself judged and which by rigorous discipline she must try to assume the body of early adolescence, slight and unformed, a body lacking flesh or substance, a body in whose very contours the image of immaturity has been inscribed. The requirement that a woman maintain a smooth and hairless skin carries further the theme of inexperience, for an infantilized face must accompany her infantilized body, a face that never ages or furrows its brow in thought. The face of the ideally feminine woman must never display the marks of character, wisdom, and experience that we admire in men. (p. 83) The idealized feminine early pubescent body is amenable to sexual subordination, turning women into docile and compliant companions of men (Bartky, 1988). This ideal is very slim, far thinner than what women’s bodies naturally tend to be; a mature woman’s body, with fat on her hips and thighs, is presented by the media as problematic and is considered unattractive (McKinley, 2002; Rodin et al., 1985). This focus on areas of fat that are typically feminine, such as stomach, hips, thighs, and breasts, communicates the message that the individual is not acceptable, and indeed that women in general are not acceptable (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Femininity as a style of flesh requires a radical transformation of the female body, to what some describe as something unimagined (Bartky, 1988). It is considered imperative that women must diet and exercise to achieve control over their bodies (Bordo, 1988; Szekely, 1988). The slender ideal, and the diet and exercise regimes that are used to attain it, are inseparable; women are meant to go to the gym and resist hunger, while achieving slenderness and its connotations of fragility and lack of power (Bordo, 1997). While both behaviour and body size are mandated, a conundrum exists whereby “weight is not a behaviour; it is a physical trait…. despite popular belief, you cannot presume to know a person’s behaviour based solely on their weight” (Allison, 2012, para. 23-24). While a man may be celebrated for his style, wit, and intelligence, “no female can achieve the status of romantic or sexual ideal without the appropriate body” (Bordo, 1988, p.
13 101). Indeed, being female involves “living out materialities of bodies” (Young, 2005, p. 6). Women mutilate themselves internally, through dieting and other forms of bodily regulation such as girdles and corsets, to achieve this (Bordo, 1988). Ultimately, women’s bodies are evaluated according to “standards that she had no part in establishing and that remain outside her control” (Young, 2005, p. 77); an individual woman may enjoy the attention inherent in evaluation, or may loathe and fear it (Young, 2005). Women’s bodily insecurity is fuelled by feminine values of passivity and compliance (Thompson, 1994). According to Young (2005): Normative femininity detaches persons who fall under its disciplines from expressions or enactments of power and authority. Disciplines of the feminine, finally, aim to mask or subordinate the raw facts of embodiment, to make the body “pretty” by constraining fluid flesh, masking its organic smells with perfumes, painting skin, lips, eyes, and hair that have lost their nubile luster. (p. 5) Disciplinary techniques constructing “docile bodies” (Bartky, 1988, p. 80)for women involves perpetual and exhaustive regulation that focuses on body size, body contours, appetite, posture, comportment, and general appearance (Bartky, 1988). This reflects the feminine ideal of stasis as a source of passivity for women (Bartky, 1990). Ultimately, it begs the question as to whether there is something implicitly disgusting about the texture of female flesh (Wolf, 1991). Fatness is perceived as excess desire and is stigmatized (Farrell, 2011). The threat due to body size occurs within a “larger cultural matrix and power relations that propel women to undertake certain kinds of body transformations instead of others” (Urla & Swedlund, 2000, p. 423). The discipline of women’s bodies speaks to their subordinate status in the gender hierarchy, in which they are constantly subjected to the male gaze; women’s behaviour is disciplined by parents, teachers, the media, and their peers: Disciplinary power that inscribes femininity in the female body is everywhere and it is nowhere; the disciplinarian is everyone and yet no one in particular. Women regarded as overweight, for example, report that they are regularly admonished to diet, sometimes by people they scarcely know. (Bartky, 1988, p. 74)
14 The focus on the appearance of self and others leaves out the whole, the unified person (Wolf, 1991). Rather than encouraging women to master their own lives, this focus creates an excess of self-scrutiny, exercise compulsions, eating disorders, and self-castigation (Bordo, 1997). The ideal body weight for women is unrealistically low and unlikely to be realized in practice by the majority of women (Pipher, 1994; Urla & Swedlund, 2000). Actual body size and weight include a sizable genetic and biological component, the denial of which can result in both physical and psychological damage due to a pervasive sense of bodily deficiency and repeated weight loss attempts (Bacon, 2010; Bacon & Aphramor, 2011; Bartky, 1988; Rodin et al., 1985). However, a focus on appearance results in women resisting the “incontrovertible evidence that dieting is futile and dangerous” (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995, preface). Dieting often undermines proper nutrition and creates health problems (Bacon, 2010; Bacon & Aphramor, 2011; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Main & Kelly, 2005; Rodin et al., 1985). In addition, a focus on appearance creates a problematic relationship between women and food, with women focused on how food consumption might make them look, rather than what it allows them to do (Szekely, 1988). Additionally, part of the work done when striving for weight loss involves pain, tedium, constriction, semi-starvation, and constant self-surveillance; however, these costs, and the harshness of such a regimen, do not imply that the beauty and weight loss regimen itself is rejected (Bartky, 1988). The expectations around appearance also encourage women to ignore or reject their authentic selves—if, in fact, that self has ever been known to them. Thus, appearance pressures impact women’s identity, resulting in women identifying with how they look rather than who they are or who they want to be (Main & Kelly, 2005). Alienation from the self is a problematic requirement, which can distract from developing other human capacities and can create a sense of emptiness (Bartky, 1990; Reilly, 1999; Szekely, 1988). According to Wolf (1991, p. 14),
15 “most urgently, women’s identity must be premised upon our ‘beauty’ so we will remain vulnerable to outside approval, carrying the vital sense organ of self-esteem exposed to the air.” Society imparts the belief that there is an acceptable size, which results in women of a variety of sizes panicking at any sign of weight gain (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Even women who do attain the cultural ideal of thinness continue to experience the same anxieties, anxieties that are contained within their bodies. The pain an individual woman experiences from this sense of never being good enough is not linked to her appearance vis-à-vis the cultural ideal; lovely women may not feel beautiful and thin women may feel fat (Wolf, 1991). Women’s continual striving to meet cultural ideals implies that the rules for how to meet these ideals are unclear. However, the punishment for breaking the rules is clearly harsh, and divides women through competition and through the aging process (Pipher, 1994; Wolf, 1991). According to Bartky (1990), appearance focus stands in the way of “an authentic delight in the body” (p. 42). Generally, women’s strength, varieties of physical shape, and experiences of joy are not celebrated under these conditions (Szekely, 1988). According to Wolf (1991), an appearance focus, Prevents women from fully inhabiting the body, keeping us waiting for an apotheosis that will never arrive. It is meant to keep us from being at ease in the flesh or in the present, those two erotically and politically dangerous places for a woman to be; mourning the past and fearing the future, pacified. (pp. 128-129) The bodily ideals of size are problematic in a number of ways, not the least of which is the shift from moralizing fatness for aesthetic reasons to moralizing fatness for purported health reasons, arguably in order to mask the focus on aesthetics. Myths conflating health and weight are frequently propagated, though contrary to claims from the media, there is a lack of research evidence directly indicting fat as a cause of ill health. Indeed, claims regarding the medical and economic consequences of fatness are often a product of bigotry, poor science, and greed (Campos, 2004; Oliver, 2006). Medical and actuarial standards of weight and height linking the
16 two from statistical averages have always presented purportedly average weights that are actually below the average healthy weight for adult women; these purported averages were initially based on groups of White youth aged 18-25, and were transformed into desirable weights for individuals (Urla & Swedlund, 2000). There is ample research evidence to support the proposition that encouraging individuals to lose weight through, engaging in lifestyle modification involving diet, exercise, and other behavior change… reliably induces short term weight loss, but the majority of individuals are unable to maintain weight loss over the long term and do not achieve the putative benefits of improved morbidity and mortality. Concern has arisen that this weight focus is not only ineffective at producing thinner, healthier bodies, but may also have unintended consequences, contributing to food and body preoccupation, repeated cycles of weight loss and regain, distraction from other personal health goals and wider health determinants, reduced self-esteem, eating disorders, other health decrement, and weight stigmatization and discrimination. (Bacon & Aphramor, 2011, Abstract) It is beyond the scope of the present study to include the wealth of research on the erroneous conflation of weight and health. However, Bacon (2010), Campos (2004), Kolata (2007), and Oliver (2006) have reviewed this literature extensively. 1.2.3. Changes Over Time. Ultimately, femininity can be understood as a caricatured presentation of the ruling feminine mystique, which is a culture and gender statement of the dictates of a given period in time. Body ideals shift across time, ethnic groups, class, and culture (Frieden, 1963; Urla & Swedlund, 2000). However, though the specific requirements of femininity are situated in specific times, the belief that something is fundamentally wrong with women is woven into the fabric of western civilization through theology, psychology, societal scripts, family customs, and history (Reilly, 1999). As each feminine mystique has shifted, another has taken its place; when the feminine mystique of the past that focused on homemaking was rebutted, those fictions shifted. As the
17 women’s movement took apart other fictions of femininity, new ones developed to take their place (Wolf, 1991). Modern culture represses female oral appetites just as Victorian culture repressed female sexual appetites, “from the top of the power structure downward, for a political purpose” (Wolf, 1991, p. 97), though arguably sexual appetites are, at times, transposed into oral appetites (as addressed subsequently in the current chapter). However, female bodies pursuing thin ideals often find themselves as depressed and physically ill as women did in the nineteenth century, when pursuing feminine ideals of domesticity and dependency (Bordo, 1997). Ultimately, the work of social control of women in the western world has been strengthened and reassigned to one issue: the inexhaustible work of beauty. Some note the historical linkages of thinner body ideals for women as being connected to women’s increased struggle for economic, legal, and sexual power, in which a backlash defines women as childlike and thin: In this age of feminist assertion men are drawn to women of childish body and mind because there is something less disturbing about the vulnerability and helplessness of a small child—and something truly disturbing about the body and mind of a mature woman. (Chernin, 1981, p. 110) However, beauty is not universal or changeless, and the beauty myth or ideal that women are expected to strive for always demands certain behaviours, such as striving for weight loss. The qualities that a given period of time defines as beautiful are often merely symbols of female behaviour that are considered desirable (Wolf, 1991). The current body shape and size that is in fashion is small, and as women have varying dimensions that do not often fall within such rigorous confines, they diet in an attempt to match the ideal (Wolf, 1991; Bartky, 1988). Some posit that women’s focus on achieving a smaller body size is accentuated under consumer capitalism (Urla & Swedlund, 2000). However, given how women’s figures have varied over time and across cultures, there is no such thing as universal, objective attractiveness (Wolf, 1991; Bartky, 1988).
18 The focus on thinness is culturally specific and is a fairly recent historical development. For example, the Venus von Willendorf, an Austrian relic from 25,000 years ago, is a depiction of a woman with large breasts, stomach, hips, thighs, and bum. In the past, an hourglass figure implied confinement and immobility; the corset came to be used during a time of increasing feminist activities (Bordo, 1988). The artists Rubens and Raphael represented women as full, round, and voluptuous; their paintings were fleshy and today would be considered too plump, as demonstrated by recent re-creations of these art works featuring women of smaller body sizes (Daily Mail reporter, 2012). In the western world, a thinner standard emerged in the Romantic era in the late 1800s (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994). Thinness was in fashion in the 1920s with the flapper look; the flapper style implied carefree boyishness, but this freedom was an illusion as “any obsessively cultivated sexual style must inevitably be” (Bordo, 1988, p. 109). The trend shifted again during the post-war years, and the beauty ideal was epitomized by Marilyn Monroe, herself a curvaceous size 16 (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994). Though her actual body size has been a problematic topic of debate, Marilyn Monroe was visibly larger than contemporary models and actresses (Stein, 2009). Western beauty images dominate popular culture. However, even within the modern world, there are varieties of ideals: the Maori idealize large female genitals, and the Padung idealize droopy breasts (Wolf, 1991). In the Nigerian Odaabes, the women hold power and the males focus on male beauty, spending hours painting and dressing themselves (Wolf, 1991). This variation over time and across cultures refutes the mistaken notion that there is one universal, standardized bodily ideal of beauty. 1.3. Women’s Body Dissatisfaction For women in North American society, being a woman often involves feeling too fat. It is normative for most western women to diet, to spend a great deal of time and energy worrying
19 about their appearance, and to be dissatisfied with their weight and body size (Rodin et al., 1985; Thompson, 1994). This socially imposed and individually enacted infatuation with one’s bodily being is an expectation of women, in which women are meant to focus on how their bodies appear to the exclusion of how one’s body feels (Bartky, 1990; Pipher, 1994). The unequivocal expectation is for women to be thin, and the relentless pursuit of thinness is pervasive (Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991). Indeed, dieting and other forms of disordered eating behaviour and attitudes are so common that women are considered abnormal if they do not diet (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994). Main and Kelly (2005, p. 13) described the way that North American women live: Under the terms of a widely accepted Body Myth: that our self-worth (and only worth to others) is (and ought to be) based on how we look, what we weigh, and what we eat. We look for life’s meaning and the answer to life’s challenges in the shape of our bodies. Problematically, women are culturally conditioned to hate their bodies, “which are after all themselves” (Pipher, 1994, p. 184). Women strive to shape their bodies to suit an ideal; there is a great discrepancy between this ideal weight and the weights of the majority of actual women (Pipher, 1994; Urla & Swedlund, 2000). However, the unattainable body standard is presented as normal, which makes the “normative negative body experiences of women understandable” (McKinley, 2002, p. 56). As well, women tend to overestimate their own body size, particularly the fat bearing areas of the waist and hips; they note strong differentiation between their own bodies and that of the ideal female figure, and discrepancies between the two are seen as flaws, which invoke self-criticism (Rodin et al., 1985). Additionally, women want to be thinner than they believe that men want them to be, as well as underestimating men’s preferences regarding women’s body size to be smaller than what most men’s actual preference is (Rodin et al., 1985). This does not negate the problems with legions of women basing their self-esteem on their perception of what men desire, however it is reflective of the ways in which weight control becomes a goal in and of itself.
20 It is important to note that women’s focus on body weight is not limited to larger women. Slender women also complain of hating their thighs, stomach, and other body parts (Bordo, 1988). Many researchers describe this focus as almost universal among women in contemporary western societies (Rodin et al., 1985). It creates a scenario in which women view their bodies as projects through which to actualize goals; body size comes to define how women feel about themselves, independent of the ways in which body-based goals have been shaped by broader social and historical contexts (Szekely, 1988). Women often see weight loss as a goal in and of itself, and speak about their body fat as though it is not part of them; rather the fat is what is standing between them and their ideal self (Rodin et al., 1985). Feminist theories posit that women are socialized to be oriented towards the approval of others, and indeed, society does reward women with thin bodies. Fat is seen as “so blatantly bad, shameful and disgusting that it is the arch enemy against which a woman must always be on guard and which she must exorcize at whatever cost in labour, time and money” (Szekely, 1988, p. 71). Children learn that larger people are to be stigmatized, and people with higher body weights suffer sanctions in terms of social interactions and economics—sanctions that are primarily directed at women (Pipher, 1994; Rodin et al., 1985). In a study of 600 doctors, more than 50% of primary care physicians viewed patients described as obese as awkward, unattractive, ugly, and noncompliant (Foster et al., 2003). In a comprehensive review of the stigma of obesity, Puhl and Heuer (2009) found that fat individuals were highly stigmatized and faced multiple forms of prejudice and discrimination based on their weight, and that this discrimination differentially impacted women. Through systematic literature reviews of studies published between January 2000 and May 2008, Puhl and Heuer found that the prevalence of weight discrimination in the United States increased by 66% over the past decade. Their review documented that weight bias translated into: inequities in employment
21 settings via lower wages for fat employees and discriminatory hiring practices; inequalities in health-care facilities through unsatisfactory treatment; and inequalities in educational institutions, including lower educational attainment due to weight based stigma. This anti-fat bias was often due to widespread negative stereotypes of fat people as lazy, unmotivated, lacking in self-discipline, less competent, noncompliant, and sloppy. They also found that offensive rhetoric is not unusual in media portrayals of obesity. The primary element of this societal prejudice focuses on bodily fat—particularly the fat that denotes feminine areas of the body—which has become associated with sexual and social vulnerability, and incompetence (Bordo, 1997). Fat women are seen as a visible manifestation of the parts that all women are taught to hate, and are therefore punished and humiliated in a variety of contexts, including public commentary on their size (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Fat women are a cautionary tale, thus women are taught that a key element of conventional femininity is to engage in behaviour that involves “the discipline of perfecting the body as an object” (Bordo, 1997, p. 101). This body dissatisfaction can be seen as an active process in which women engage with their bodies as part of the work of “doing femininity” (Davis, 1997, p. 12). However, working to achieve these cultural body standards deprives women of time, energy, and money (McKinley, 2002). Women learn well the cultural myth that reinforces the false reality that “changing my body equals changing my life” (Main & Kelly, 2005, p. 13). A focus on appearance, primarily body size and weight, results in women spending their “lives in the futile quest for power through physical transformation,” in which the focus is on the body rather than life in general (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995, p. x). Ultimately, this focus on slimness and obsession with appearance takes time away from relationship building and other important life goals, even taking time away from practical considerations such as paying bills (Thompson, 1994). Appetite
22 is monitored, governed, controlled, and constrained; however, the body needs food to survive, which frames both food and the body as the enemy, which must be disciplined (Bartky, 1988). 1.3.1. Problems with the Goal of Bodily Control. According to Simone de Beauvoir (1952, p. 332), “to lose confidence in one’s body is to lose confidence in one’s self.” There are numerous problems with the expectation of women’s bodily dissatisfaction and striving for purported physical perfection. Women may become afraid to tell the truth about what is bothering them, instead resorting to the language of fat, in which the words “I feel fat” (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995, p. 9) are a substitute for addressing meaningful issues in women’s lives (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Some view body acceptance and women’s body striving as a social justice issue, in that women’s body dissatisfaction can account for numerous mental health struggles for women, including depression, sexual dysfunction, and eating disorders (Harrison & Fredrickson, 2003; Reilly, 1999). Women’s body dissatisfaction creates a pervasive experience of concern for women; “I know no woman… for whom her body is not a fundamental problem: its clouded meaning, its fertility, its desire, its so-called frigidity, its bloody speech, its silences, its changes and mutilations, its rapes and ripenings” (Rich, 1976, p. 284). 1.3.1.1. Objectification and internalization. Dieting and starvation requires a cleaving of the body and the self: a person is split into parts, fragmented with one aspect elevated above the others (Bartky, 1990; Szekely, 1988). The sexual objectification of women is a pervasive element of the expectation of body dissatisfaction; “men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at. This determines not only most relations between men and women but also the relation of women to themselves” (Berger, 1988, p. 47). Within this cultural context, all women are defined not as people with talents and
23 interests, but as consumers, commodities, and as objects to be watched and evaluated as to whether or not they fit this cultural standard (McKinley, 2002; Pipher, 1994; Szekely, 1988). Women have learned to relate to their bodies in an objectified way, observing and treating their bodies as if viewed from the outside (Bartky, 1990; Jack, 1991); the gaze from the other is internalized, and bodily practices contribute to the sense of the “body as an object for others that is not right in its present shape and size, as something to control and combat” (Szekely, 1988, p. 139). Women scrutinize, evaluate, and criticize bodies that almost universally fall short of the ideal, positioning themselves as observing both themselves and others, and judging with admiration or disgust (Rodin et al., 1985; Young, 2005). When something is internalized, it is accepted into the structure of the self, as coming from one’s own desires, which makes it difficult to challenge and serves to conceal the external pressure to perform (Bartky, 1988; Jack, 1991; McKinley, 2002). In this way, bodily achievement is connected to self worth, resulting in a short-lived sense of power when the goal of weight loss and control of one’s is approximated, and shame when it is not. In order to establish the legitimacy of judging women via their bodies, the cultural standards must be believed to be attainable, regardless of evidence to the contrary (McKinley, 2002). This relentless objectification of women’s bodies produces a sense of body alienation and inadequacy in many women, as women learn a self-perception based on self-criticism (Bartky, 1990; Jack, 1991; Reilly, 1999). It is ironic that in the midst of this unrelenting pressure to be thin and to adhere to specific standards of beauty, women are often dismissed and ridiculed for having any interest in “trivial things” (Bartky, 1988, p. 73) that relate back to beauty (Bartky, 1988). Objectification theory posits that girls and women who experience sexual objectification within their sociocultural context are at increased mental health risk of depression, sexual disfunction, and eating disorders (Fredrickson & Roberts, 1997). Objectified body consciousness
24 is a measure of body surveillance and an internalization of cultural body standards, along with beliefs of appearance control. McKinley (2002) found that women with increased levels of bodily surveillance believe that how they look is more important than how they feel; they have more body shame, more body dissatisfaction, and less sense of personal well-being. Men were found to have lower levels of body surveillance and shame when compared to women. Quinn, Kallen, Twenge, and Fredrickson (2006) studied the disruptive effect of self-objectification on performance (utilizing the Stroop colour-naming task), in 83 women of diverse backgrounds. Results showed that participants in a state of self-objectification exhibited decreased performance, suggesting that feeling objectified can cause women to split their attention between tasks at hand and the monitoring of their appearance. Objectification therefore may drain women’s resources in executing daily tasks, such as taking exams, presenting projects, interviewing for jobs, or competing in athletic events; small decreases in performance can impact outcome and reduce joy in everyday activities (Quinn et al., 2006). Another study, which found that self-objectification consumes attentional resources—as manifested in diminished mental performance—was completed by Fredrickson, Roberts, Noll, Quinn, and Twenge (1988). With a total of 154 participants, researchers found that women in a state of self-objectification experienced shame about their bodies, which, in turn, predicted restrained eating, as well as poorer performance on advanced math tests. These effects were not found among men. In Smolak and Murnen’s (2008) study, three components of body image (drive for thinness, drive for muscularity, and drive for leanness) were assessed in a sample of 232 White college-age participants, and relationships between these and gender, gender norm endorsement, and self-objectification were established. They concluded that self-objectification, and body image in particular, is gendered; men are more invested in muscularity and the techniques used to achieve muscles, whereas women are more motivated by a drive for thinness.
25 The authors concluded that objectification and gender roles work together to produce a drive for thinness. 1.3.2. Shifts in Adolescence. For women, adhering to the expectations of femininity is the chief route to acceptance and success. Early adolescence is a time of rigorous training for the feminine role, whereby women give up activities culturally defined as masculine and shrink their goals (Bordo, 1997; Pipher, 1994). Girls learn that in order to avoid others negatively judging their bodies, they must view their own bodies from an outside perspective. This shapes women’s consciousness around their bodies, and reinforces a dependence on others for approval (McKinley, 2002). Almost all teenage girls feel fat, worry about their weight, diet, and feel guilty when they eat (Pipher, 1994). Studies have found that as many as half of young girls want to lose weight; Clark and Tiggemann (2006) studied 100 girls aged nine to 12 years. About half (49 percent) of the girls displayed a desire to be thinner. The girls’ conversations with their peers regarding acceptable appearance indicated that internalization of the thin ideal was significantly related to body dissatisfaction. This is an early initiation into the norm of fat talk, which will be discussed in a subsequent chapter. The results provided evidence for the existence of an appearance culture consisting of interrelated media and peer influences among girls as young as nine to 12 years of age (Clark & Tiggemann, 2006). During early adolescence, girls “crash and burn” (Pipher, 1994, p. 19) by losing resiliency and optimism. They become less curious, less assertive, less energetic, and less inclined to take risks (Pipher, 1994). Their personalities become more deferential, self-critical, and depressive, and they report great unhappiness with their own bodies (Pipher, 1994). They also learn that men have true power, and that attractiveness is necessary and sufficient for female success. De Beauvoir (1952) explained that teenage girls realized that only men have power, and
26 that the girls’ only potential source of power comes from becoming consenting, adored objects. Pipher (1994) described this phenomenon as “Girls who were the subjects of their own lives become the objects of others’ lives” (p. 21). Girls put away their independent selves and submissively enter adult existence because of a conflict between their autonomous selves and the need to be feminine. “A divorce between their properly human condition and her feminine vocation” (de Beauvoir, 1952, p. 348) occurs, in which “girls stop being and start seeming” (de Beauvoir, as cited in Pipher, 1994, p. 22) thus becoming “female impersonators” (de Beauvoir, as cited in Pipher, 1994, p. 22). Adolescent girls forget their original delight with themselves—their vision narrows, and they lose the ability to act spontaneously as they learn the danger in being labelled unnatural, unfeminine, or too intense (Reilly, 1999). Females emerge from adolescence with poor selfimage, low expectations, and less confidence than boys, as concluded by a survey of 3000 children from grades 4 through10 commissioned by the American Association of University Women (American Association of University Women, 1994; Pipher, 1994; Reilly, 1999). In a study of depression in adolescent girls, Ross, Ali, and Toner (2003) utilized participatory methodology to conduct focus groups with 48 girls, and found that preoccupation with body image, weight, and appearance were perceived by girls to contribute to their depression, focusing on the pressure to be thin. Girls in the study noted anger regarding the media’s ideal as negatively impacting their self-esteem. Girls often deal with the cultural pressure to abandon themselves by conforming, withdrawing, being depressed, or getting angry (Pipher, 1994). Their values progressively begin to conform more to gender stereotypes, such as politeness and pleasantness, rather than originality or integrity (Pipher, 1994). Girls learn to defer to others and to silence their own truth, becoming alienated from an inner sense of what is true (Reilly, 1999).
27 1.3.3. Intersectionality. The pursuit of thinness is one component of attractive appearance, and is linked to sexuality, work, and class (Szekely, 1988). Some argue that the typical construction of femininity and weight homogenizes, normalizes, and erases race, ethnicity, class, and other differences impacting all women, by insisting that all women fit into it (Bartky, 1998; Bordo, 1997). In the North American women’s movement of the 1970s and 1980s, White women focused on genderrelated oppression and ignored examples of oppression related to race, sexual preference, class, and age (Lorde, 1990). Intersectionality reflects the ways in which various elements of social location and identity—including class and sexuality—interact, shape experiences, construct the social world, and intersect in “ways that cannot be captured wholly by looking at the race or gender dimensions of those experiences separately” (Crenshaw, 1991, p. 1244). Beauty and weight standards are not necessarily universal (Shaw, 2006; Thompson, 1994). Though slimness is privileged, women of African descent who live in North America have been historically resistant to fat anxiety and have opposed the notion that slim is healthy (Shaw, 2006). Shaw (2006) argues that Black women’s struggles, while reflective of historic efforts to devalue Black womanhood, are also reflective of resistance. Thompson (1994) argued that Black and Jewish women were often taught to be assertive, self-directive, and active in family life and in public. Thompson suggested that representations of femininity in those cultural groups was not passive and compliant, in contrast with the classist socialization pattern which she found among middle and upper class Protestant White women. White women must be thin, and size is the most powerful marker to judge White women’s physical attractiveness; however, for women of colour, body size is one of several factors that comprise physical attractiveness (Milkie, 1999; Thompson, 1994).
28 Parker et al. (1995) studied the differences between body image ideals and dieting behaviours among Black and White adolescent females. Qualitative and quantitative data were drawn from 300 girls. They found that Black girls were more flexible than their White counterparts in their concepts of beauty, and spoke about “making what you got work for you” (Parker et al., 1995, p. 108). In comparison, many White teenaged girls in the study expressed dissatisfaction with their body shape and were found to be more rigid in their concepts of beauty. In contrast to the envy and competitiveness which marked White participants’ comments regarding others whom they perceived to be attractive, Black participants described themselves as being supportive of each other. In focus groups, Black girls talked about receiving positive feedback from family members, friends, and community members about “looking good” (Parker et al., 1995, p. 108), while White girls identified working towards bodily perfection and the pursuit of impossible goals. The authors suggested that, while women of colour have been encouraged to adhere to the value of seeking thinness, a second ideology propagated within Black culture has been built around an approach to life where improvisation is valued and identity is constructed through creativity and style. In Milkie’s (1999) comparison of the impact of beauty images of girls and women in the media on Black girls’ and White girls’ self-concepts, she found that all girls viewed the representations of women in the media as unrealistic and preferred to see what they described as “real girls” (p. 190) in the media. However, White girls believed that they were still evaluated on the basis of these images, and they still wished to achieve body appearance standards transmitted through the media. In contrast, Black girls in this study criticized the artificiality and lack of diversity in these images. The Black girls were more immune to negative social comparisons between their bodies and the media images in part because they held the belief that female and
29 male friends were also critical of these media images, and thus appreciated a wider variety of attractive appearances. Other researchers have argued that though the ideal of slenderness may be partly resisted by various racial and ethnic groups, the ideal is still the norm across diverse groups of girls and women (Bordo, 1993; Bordo, 1997). It is imperative to note that researchers generally know little about anyone who is outside of the modal US college student cohort (including knowing little about women of colour, women who are lesbian or bisexual, those from lower classes, those with disabilities, adolescents, and older women), and there is little empirical knowledge of the ways that dominant social constructions of women’s bodies interact with other constructions (Lorde, 1990; McKinley, 2002). Thus it is difficult to parse out the particular impact of any single element of an individual’s identity on body experiences, as multiple elements tend to be intertwined, within the context of the presence of in-group differences (Crenshaw, 1991). Ultimately, additional qualitative and quantitative research is needed to address the similarities and differences regarding how diverse women think about their bodies (McKinley, 2002). 1.3.4. Relationship to Eating Disorders. Many feminist theorists and researchers have noted a direct link on the continuum between women’s normal daily practices around body and weight control, and eating disorders (Bordo, 1997; Rodin et al., 1985; Szekely, 1988). There is considerable overlap between clinical populations of women with eating disorders and non-clinical women dieters with regards to eating behaviour and attitudes towards body and weight. Specifically, both involve the loss of voice, feeding others and starving the self, and whittling down the space one’s body takes up (Rodin et al., 1985). Eating disorders often begin with the conventional practice of dieting (Bordo, 1997). Szekely’s (1988) interviews with women with eating disorders indicated similarities between
30 clinical populations and non-clinical populations in women’s pursuit of thinness. The clinical sample did not represent a “radical departure” (p. 18) vis-à-vis their eating practices; all were “striving to produce themselves as attractively thin, they were striving for their very existence” (p. 16). Szekely argued that those labelled anorexic were not thought disordered, but were instead tricked by promises made to women. While women with anorexia may see their bodies as larger in more extreme ways than other women, this perception is not radically different from how most women perceive their bodies (Bordo, 1988). Piran and Cormier (2005) studied the impact of the social construction of women and internalized social expectations on women’s development of disordered eating. They studied 394 women community members, ages 18 - 25 years, and found that disrupted eating patterns and body weight/shape preoccupation were predicted by the suppression of the outward expression of anger, silencing one’s voice and needs, and the objectification of one’s own body. Bordo (1997) drew a comparison between various mental health issues women have been labelled with over the years, including hysteria, agoraphobia, and anorexia, and stated that the “body of the sufferer is deeply inscribed with an ideological construction of femininity, emblematic of the period in question” (p. 93). Bordo proposed that psychopathologies develop and are defined within a culture, and are also reflective of problems with the culture. However, labelling eating problems as an illness can make the context of women’s insubordination invisible, as it then becomes a domain of psychiatry, not of culture (Szekely, 1988). 1.4. Maintenance of Social Control Through Women’s Body Dissatisfaction Feminist theory posits that the expectation of women’s dissatisfaction with their bodies is inextricably linked to politics and the maintenance of gendered power, because ultimately, “the gendering of the body is always political” (Smith-Rosenberg, 1999, p. 171). The issue is not actually women’s bodies, but institutional power—patriarchy limits women’s access to power,
31 and is at the root of women’s striving for bodily control (Thompson, 1994; Wolf, 1991). Women’s bodies can therefore be viewed as “a locus of practical cultural control” (Bordo, 1997, p. 104). This position is an indictment of a culture that suppresses women’s hunger and makes women ashamed of their appetites, needs, and bodies, while at the same time demanding that women constantly attempt to transform their bodies (Bordo, 1997; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). The question of whom these demands are serving and profiting must be asked, because they certainly are not serving women (Wolf, 1991). Beauty and bodily control are understood by feminist theory to have become a currency system determined by politics, whereby value is assigned to women’s appearance. The techniques of discipline and surveillance within the system reproduce asymmetrical power relations between men and women (Diprose, 1994). This is a form of social control intended to halt women’s advancement, and is also reflective of the way that women’s bodies have become sites of domination (Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991). The agents that enforce this control include individuals and agencies that depend on male dominance, including medical, legal, political, and media systems (Wolf, 1991). These systems continue to make promises to women that foster the belief that they can control their bodies through restriction, and if they do not, they are individually responsible for their failure to control themselves (Szekely, 1988). However, slimmer waists and smaller thighs will not result in real confidence, visibility, or power for women; actual political progress requires a focus on women’s lives, through antidiscrimination, penalties for sexual violence, and childcare, among other goals (Wolf, 1991). Actual power would involve women’s recognition, achievement, and encouragement, as well as fewer sex-segregated jobs, and more opportunities for women in mathematics, sciences, and sports (Thompson, 1994). Indeed, women’s obsession with their bodies may vary in magnitude with the presence or absence of other sources of self-esteem, and the capacity to earn a living
32 independent of appearance (Bartky, 1990). Ultimately, “we do not need to change our bodies, we need to change the rules” (Wolf, 1991, p. 289). 1.4.1. Appetite as Danger because Women Are Too Much. According to feminist theory, women receive the message that their bodies are meant to be looked at, admired, and desired. However, a woman’s body will never be good enough, as she takes up too much space, is too loud, and wants too much (Bartky, 1990; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). This idea of women as having uncontrollable appetites and wanting too much sexually and emotionally, in terms of contact, attention, reassurance, and affection, is how women often experience themselves. This fear generally revolves around sexuality, and is filled with hunger and eating metaphors, which creates an ideology of the insatiable woman. This concept, as well as anxiety over women’s uncontrollable hunger, tends to peak when women gain independence and political or social power, or during social crises, such as witch hunts (Bordo, 1988). Women often tell themselves that they take up too much space, and when they believe they have overstepped a boundary, they attack themselves for the transgression by calling themselves fat as a way of keeping ideas, feelings, and ambitions in check. Within this paradigm, women are taught that their hungers and desires must be tightly controlled, and that fear, guilt, and shame follow pleasure (Wolf, 1991). Indeed, an appearance focus can be understood as involving the repression of authentic female desires—a repression which is essential in maintaining gender domination (Bordo, 1997; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). A focus on women’s physical appetite for food may be a way of transposing their unspeakable desire for power, or fears of unrestrained sexual desire (Bordo, 1997). However, it is noteworthy that women’s sexuality and sexual practices are neither inherently libratory nor inherently repressive, as they are either co-optable or can be a source of resistance (Sawicki, 1988). Indeed, women’s place in their sexual lives mirrors women’s
33 problematic place in society (Hite, 1976). The discourse on human sexuality as a regime of power-knowledge-pleasure, and the way sex is spoken about, is related to forms of desire and control of everyday pleasure (Foucault, 1978). In the Victorian era, women were conceptualized as objects of male desire, in order to emphasize romance and downplay female sexual desire. That remains the case today, with the cultural story that young women want intimacy rather than sex, and there is little research on sexual desire in either adolescent girls or women (Tolman, 2003; Weitz, 2003). Some theorists recognize that both socioeconomic and political forces shape and inhibit the experience of, and expression of, women’s sexual desire (Meana, 2010); “sexual desire is a holistic, emotional, and interpersonal experience for women… contextual factors are crucially important to their sexual desire and behaviour” (Goldhammer & McCabe, 2011, p. 27). Researchers posit that recommendations for future research need to focus on understanding women’s sexual desire, which must be based in women’s lived experiences. Ultimately, “differing socio-cultural, political, economic, relational, psychological, and biological processes interact to shape different forms of sexual desire in different contexts over the lifespan” (Koch, Mansfield, & Wood, 2006, p. 242). Thus, sexuality as a political struggle, based on understandings and definitions of women’s sexual desire, has “become a battleground for differing theoretical and political perspectives” (Meana, 2010, p. 104). However, redefining sexuality has the potential to strengthen women’s identity, and enable women to see their personal lives more clearly (Hite, 1976). According to Dews, the “libidinal body” (Dews, 1984, p. 92) upon which discipline is imposed, and the impulse to spontaneity and pleasure, may be a locus of resistance (Dews, 1984). Therefore, voice to female desire must be created as a political strategy (Sawicki, 1988; Young, 2005). Sex is often considered taboo for women. This is a feminist concern, regarding “how best to integrate sexuality into the project of human liberation” (Snitow, Stansell, Thompson, 1983, p. 13). Given
34 that, “our inability to name and describe our bodily experiences also alienates us from our sexuality which might enable us to transform our relationship to the body” (Szekely, 1988, p. 22). To combat messages denying women’s sexual desire and agency, it is important to create new and different representations of the self as sexual subjects, with desire, pleasure and fulfilment at the centre (hooks, 2003). Indeed, sexuality is “an area for play, for experimentation, a place to test what the possibilities might be for an erotic life and a social world that would answer our desires” (Snitow et al., 1983, p. 43). 1.4.2. The Role of Media. The media aims to promote the consumption of ideas and goods, and to inform women and girls regarding what their major preoccupation should be (Waller & Shaw, 1994). The fashion-beauty complex produces in woman an estrangement from her bodily being: On the one hand, she is it and is scarcely allowed to be anything else; on the other hand, she must exist perpetually at a distance from her physical self, fixed at this distance in a permanent posture of disapproval. (Bartky, 1990, p. 40) Women are immersed in media images (Orbach, 1994). Media images produce strong emotional responses, as well as dissatisfaction with women’s own bodies and a desire to attain the ideal (Waller & Shaw, 1994). However, women have no control over the unrealistic images that give rise to their sense of deficiency, nor can they control the changes in those expectations that occur over time, which are conveyed in the media through images of breasts being bound as opposed to padded, or eyebrows being thick as opposed to thin. This leads to infatuation with what women are not, in an inferior body (Bartky, 1990). Media images have a negative effect on women’s self image, body image, and selfesteem (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994; Wolf, 1991). Pinhas, Toner, Ali, Garfinkel, and Stuckless (1999) found that, in a study of 118 women, viewing images of female beauty via fashion models
35 had an immediate impact on the mood of the women, including increased anger and depressed mood after observing only 20 images of the thin ideal. Contemporary representations of women transcending their appetite and publicly displaying the thin ideal in terms of power, will, mastery, and professional success are promoted in ads, television, movies, and in magazines (Bordo, 1997; Thompson, 1994). The dissemination of images of ideal women occurs throughout the media, and western economies are dependant on these images for consumption (Wolf, 1991). Media advises women to “become who they really are” (Szekely, 1988, p. 77) through a fantasy offered by food products and weight loss groups, which are themselves a market of commodities controlled by capital. In a multi-million-dollar weight reduction industry, where the system has institutional power, most consumers are women (Thompson, 1994). This repressive media system produces false needs and controls the conditions under which these needs are satisfied (Bartky, 1990). A focus towards increasing profits is a precondition of the objectification and feminization of women’s bodies (Szekely, 1988). The fashion-beauty complex cultivates anxiety and presents the self as the only instrument to take away the guilt and shame this system produces (Bartky, 1990). In Milkie’s (2002) qualitative interviews of editors of girl’s magazines, girl readers often expressed unhappiness and dissatisfaction that the magazines portrayed an unrealistic female image, particularly in terms of body size and shape. Readers persistently requested that average, normal, or realistic looking girls who looked more like them be shown. Milkie found that at times, editors supported the girls’ concerns, yet they were also constrained by organizational expectations, such as advertisers’ preferences and widely accepted norms. However, several editors also refused to accept the girls’ concerns, stating that “real girls” (Milkie, 2002, p. 839) bodies were overweight and ugly; editors focused on the importance of fantasy in choosing which bodies to depict. This study demonstrated the importance of illuminating and
36 understanding the processes by which individual critiques of media portrayals of femininity and female bodies become struggles at the institutional level. The voices of girls requesting change are ultimately ignored; the critique is diffused by those with power, ultimately resulting in the maintenance and reproduction of unrealistic images of both women and girls. Women often feel like failures when comparing themselves to glamorous media images (Szekely, 1988). The contradiction is inherent: women care desperately, and obsess about attaining the ideal, but the ideal image is presented as effortless, casual, and as a representation of freedom (Bordo, 1988). There is a contradiction and mystification between the image and practice (Bordo, 1997). Even women’s sports media has had a negative impact on women, though it may present less traditional images of femininity with more muscular bodies and agentic goals. In Harrison and Fredrickson’s (2003) study of women’s sports media, selfobjectification, and mental health in 426 Black adolescent and White adolescent females, they found that exposure to women’s sports media had differing yet still negative impacts on both Black girls and White girls, and was linked to body shame, depression, and disordered eating. 1.4.3. Rewards for Adhering to the Beauty Myth and the Threat in Challenging it. Szekely (1988) described the relentless pursuit of thinness not as a passive submission to an ideal weight and body shape/size ideal, but rather a practice in which women strive to have a sense of control and self-worth in a situation that they perceive to be ruled by others, as a struggle for a place in the world, and as a struggle fraught with conflict and contradiction. Critiques of beauty and the thin ideal threaten some women with the loss of a source of gratification, as these critiques represent an appraisal of rituals that some women depend on in order to reduce their sense of bodily deficiency (Bartky, 1990). Women’s attractiveness has long been a means of survival, as women are often allowed to exist only in relation to men, and beauty does provide some women with a sense of power and
37 access in terms of attracting and marrying high-status men (Rodin et al., 1985; Szekely, 1988). Attractiveness does present the possibility of women being treated better in social situations, and self-perceived attractiveness and self-esteem are correlated (Rodin et al., 1985). This may explain why many women embrace alienated aspects of femininity, and are reluctant to part with the rewards of compliance (Bartky, 1988; Bartky, 1990). Consideration of the possibility of removal of these aspects of femininity threatens some women with de-skilling, and eliminates an aspect of personal identity that is tied to their sense of competence. Given that, for many women, a feminine body is tied to one’s sense of self, critiques of feminine behavioural expectations may threaten de-sexualisation and the annihilation of the structure of many women’s social universe (Bartky, 1998). Women also show solidarity with the beauty myth, because beauty rites provide something acceptable for women in terms of time for self (for example, through beauty practices such as manicures), sensuality, and colour (for example, through cosmetic use) (Wolf, 1991). Ultimately, if women had real choices, it is possible that appearance choices would not be such a powerful issue (Wolf, 1991). 1.5. Resistance Though there are both cultural and personal implications to rejecting bodily expectations, some women are able to resist the dictate of body dissatisfaction (Davis, 1997; Szekely, 1988). This raises the question of how “despite women’s devaluation and the pervasive hostility to women’s bodies, not all the women, and not all of the time, behave and experience themselves in ways that would be described as typically feminine” (Szekely, 1988, p. 181). Indeed, it is essential for empirical studies to note the active role that individuals play in resisting bodily oppression. By focusing on how individuals throughout history and in all walks of life have ongoingly negotiated the possibilities and limitations of their embodied experience, the body emerges as a site for mundane acts of resistance and rebellion as well as compliance. (Davis, 1997, p. 12)
38 This is an essential statement with regards to the current study; women have the capacity to, and do, negotiate their embodied experiences, and they resist the dominant body culture in a myriad of ways. Resistance to beauty and weight imperatives are inherently challenging because resistance is often condemned by the culture and by individuals within that culture who support the status quo. As stated by Wolf (1991, p. 281), “the best way to stop a revolution is to give people something to lose.” However, the alternative option is acquiescence, which only serves to perpetuate one’s own oppression, and the oppression of others, to the detriment of all women (Bell, 1993). According to Freire (2003), it is “always through action in depth that the culture of domination is culturally confronted” (p. 54). While there are benefits to building an individual’s competency through better coping skills, ultimately no mass societal-based disorders have ever been eliminated through one-to-one interventions with the afflicted person (Albee, 1984). The broader context must be altered through woman-centred solidarity, political action, and the creation of broader body positive communities. In theory, these changes will increase non-competitive and non-hierarchical relationships between women (Wolf, 1991). However, individual women may feel better about themselves by learning cultural analysis in order to clarify how the dominant culture works to oppress women. Freedom may be found in women’s capacity to choose the forms of experience through which they define themselves, and through discovering the link between domination and self-understanding (Sawicki, 1988). In turn, a critical analysis of culture can provide some insight into how to counteract the problematic dominant culture, as well as providing individual strategies for resistance (McKinley, 2002; Wolf, 1991). Wolf (1991) summarized the potential outcome of resistance in these words: If the beauty myth is religion, it is because women still lack rituals which include us; if it is economy, it is because we’re still compensated unfairly; if it is sexuality, it is because female sexuality is still a dark continent; if it is warfare, it is because women are denied ways to see ourselves as heroines, daredevils, stoics,
39 and rebels; if it is women’s culture, it is because men’s culture still resists us. When we recognize that the myth is powerful because it has claimed so much of the best of female consciousness, we can turn from it to look more clearly at all it has tried to stand in for. (p. 276) Resistance requires women to recognize the ways in which women’s bodies and practices are classified and identified by dominant discourses, and to refuse to accept those characterizations, while redefining women’s understandings of themselves and others (Sawicki, 1988). Resistance is a route towards eventual social change, and resistance must be peer driven, with the requirement of having strategies to elucidate the anti-feminist propaganda (Wolf, 1991). Given that the male gaze—which posits women as other, as objects—is a solid, clear, definite view which women have internalized, it is an essential political strategy to create and give voice to female desire and to make clear a female point of view (Young, 2005). One of the most pervasive and problematic aspects of the impact of cultural expectations on women’s body dissatisfaction is the false consciousness it creates. Women are deceived about the origin of their unhappiness, and continue to direct their struggles inward, toward themselves and their bodies, or onto other women, rather than to project their struggles outward, onto the social forces that are responsible for this deception (Bartky, 1990). Individual distress is often characterized as resulting from individual attempts at resistance, or from seeking competency to deal with injustice. A more effective strategy is to change society and focus on public good over corporate profit (Albee, 1984). Change requires recognizing the differences among women, and finding ways to use those differences in order to develop a unified vision to strive for (Lorde, 1990). Revolutionary change involves the eradication of the internalization of oppression that is “planted deep, within each of us, and which knows only the oppressor’s tactics, the oppressors’ relationships” (Lorde, 1990, p. 287). While it is important to strengthen the individual to resist the impact of the status quo, if the problem is framed as being an individual’s and within the
40 person, then the person is the only one changing, and the damaging status quo and problems in living created by the force of society remain intact (Albee, 1984). This is problematic, and is not the ultimate goal of change surrounding women’s bodily experiences. Some argue that change will only occur through overthrowing patriarchal capitalism (Szekely, 1988). Broad societal change does require altering structures of oppression, including the patterns of expectation and response, “for the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house” (Lorde, 1990, p. 287). It is demoralizing to be engaged in a struggle with potentially unreachable goals, and in order for liberation to occur, practitioners must engage in strategies to avoid demoralization (Bell, 1993). For example, levity, joy, and playful activities may disrupt the status quo or may have limited impact or power as a revolutionary strategy, but more importantly, play opens up space in which to relate non-oppressively to one’s self and others. This space has a positive impact on revolutionaries, as it allows them to glimpse, even for a moment, a space of freedom (Bell, 1993). The focus on joy in the body is an essential component of the present study. This is not to imply that happiness must become the expected position for oppressed individuals (Ahmed, 2010), rather that joy may be a self-enacted tool to further the goal of emancipation. Ultimately, according to Young (2005, p. 80): However alienated male-dominated culture makes us from our bodies, however much it gives us instruments of self-hatred and oppression, still our bodies are ourselves. We move and act in this flesh and these sinews and live our pleasures and pains in our bodies. If we love ourselves at all, we love our bodies. 1.5.1. Specific Bodily Practices of Resistance. There has been too much focus on the symbolic aspect of women’s bodies, and insufficient attention to praxis, to the practical life of bodies; this lack of attention defeats rebellion and subverts protest (Bordo, 1997). Given that women’s bodies are central to their sense of agency, the goal is for women to repossess their bodies (Rich, 1976; Weiss & Haber, 1999). However, it is challenging to stand apart from the broader cultural norms, particularly
41 when there are few role models who attend to one’s own bodily needs without the goal of thinness (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). It is essential to frame resistance from a broader perspective, recognizing that large-scale change can only be achieved through fundamental shifts in the discourse on women’s bodies. The power difference between individual resistance and institutionally supported social constraints on women must always be remembered; ultimately the focus must be on social context, not individuals and their perceived psychological problems (McKinley, 2002). Indeed, feminism focuses on changing social systems (McKinley, 2002). In the meantime, individual women need to consider ways to preserve their mental and physical health in the face of an onslaught of messages deeming their bodies inadequate. The “mind of the individual becomes an important site of resistance; the marginalized individual can construct an understanding of reality independent of the dominant group” (Ali, 2002, p. 234). Therefore, strategies that individual women can employ to resist these messages must be considered: Women’s body as a site of domination is subjected to further commodification, objectification and alienation. At the same time, control over the body is the means of resisting domination: the body is a tool to attempt to break out of a certain form of subjugation—in the hope of positioning oneself in less oppressive relationships. (Szekely, 1988, p. 18) There are a series of theorized forms of resistance that individual women might employ. While recognizing that suggesting these strategies may place undue pressure on women to resist broader cultural dictates within a context of being immersed in said dictates, potential strategies are still worth addressing. One such strategy could involve transforming one’s personal relationship with food. For example, women could choose to accept their bodies regardless of size and stop trying to lose weight, while feeding themselves where, when, what, and how much the body needs (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995).
42 Body acceptance involves a stance that is agentic and challenges cultural attitudes, while also seeking positive experiences (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Reilly, 1999). Body acceptance involves recognizing that body ideals are arbitrary, and women have been indoctrinated to believe that there is only one correct body: a thin body. Hirschmann and Munter (1995) also advocated asking questions designed to change thought patterns, such as encouraging women to ask themselves, “who says a flat stomach is best… who says that my thighs are the wrong size… What’s wrong with large butts?” (pp. 43-44). This mindset change requires one to accept individual bodily variation, to shift away from body and weight pre-occupation, to give up the false hope of weight loss, and, instead, focus on more meaningful tasks (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Women must ground a sense of self-worth in things other than pleasing others with one’s appearance, a shift to embracing oneself and living fully (Main & Kelly, 2005; Szekely, 1988). These changes require women to work towards enhancing self-esteem, and to engage in complete acceptance of one’s current location and experience. This is a route to shifting patterns and requires a rejection of negative judgments about the self, as well as the capacity to be gentle and compassionate with one’s self, thereby replacing harsh criticism of the body with tenderness (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Millman, 1991; Pipher, 1994). What would happen if all women stopped hating their bodies? (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). It is important for women to use their own language to repossess their body experiences, while simultaneously shaping their own lives (Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). Shaping one’s own life may also be achieved through journal writing and centring, and creating boundaries (Pipher, 1994). Exercising for pleasure, strength, and endurance, not weight loss, may also have a role in this process (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995). Media messages need to be changed as well, so that the media portray a larger range of sizes and shapes of models in order to discourage the idealization of an unachievable form.
43 However, given the profit motive of the media, this is unlikely (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994). Therefore, enhanced media literacy is an important route to resistance (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994). Wolf (1991) suggested there is value in maintaining a counter culture and developing better women’s rituals. Different images of beauty in female subcultures need to be located. There is value in connecting and engaging with the world by learning women’s history, particularly the backgrounds of women of substance; seek out the plays, music, films that illuminate women in three dimensions; find the biographies of women, the women’s history, the heroines that in each generation are submerged from view; fill in the terrible ‘beautiful’ blanks. We can lift ourselves and other women out of the myth—but only if we are willing to seek out and support and really look at the alternatives. (Wolf, 1991, p. 277). The importance of raising consciousness and understanding the impact of the culture on life allows for fighting back, as “intelligent resistance keeps the true self alive” (Pipher, 1994, p. 44). Additionally, consciousness-raising can lead to self-knowledge in that it enables women to “recognize and challenge the societal forces that have disempowered her” (Ali, 2002, p. 240). Discovering bodily practices of resistance can be supported by finding help in teachers, therapists, friends, or a group (Reilly, 1999). Other forms of resistance involve focusing on senses other than being seen, in order to attend to embodied experiences. For me, touch is not simply a corporeal connection, but works equally at the level of emotive and cognitive interconnection where the self and other become intertwined in a mutually affecting experience. Touch, fluidity and embodied sensuality are, then, integral to an ethics of intersubjectivity that avoids objectification, visual and separated knowing, and eradicates the distance and hierarchical privilege between the knower and the known. (Inckle, 2007, p. 100) An important and prominent potential outcome is a “sense of joy in the body as active and alive” (Bordo, 1988, p. 98). Wolf (1991) suggests that women pursue pleasure, and focus on their needs and wishes. Another possibility emerges through the celebration of female desire and power (Bordo, 1997). Refusals of control, and giving in to the body’s impulses for spontaneity
44 and pleasure are a locus of resistance (Dews, 1984). Wolf (1991) suggested that body acceptance implies a focus on confidence, sexuality, and self-esteem, which are not related to physical appearance, but are available to all women regardless of appearance. There is power in resistance. It is empowering for women to make decisions about their bodies and appetites that are based on their own needs. A woman who accepts her own body, whatever size, shape, or colour it is, is a woman who is resisting some of aspects of patriarchy, heterosexism, racism, and capitalism. For instance, it means not being a compliant consumer of packaged images and products, and not being afraid of taking up space in a “skinny” society. It means allowing herself the power and pleasure of her own desires and appetites… Reclaiming those life-enhancing ways of feeling the body can be a part of body liberation. (Shroff, 1993, pp. 114-115) 1.5.2. Already Occurring Oppositional Discourses. The relentless objectification of women’s bodies has produced forms and occasions of resistance, though they are not widespread and there would be no reason to expect them to be (Bartky, 1988). Oppositional discourses can be seen, for example, in women who lift weights, as well as radical lesbian communities (Bartky, 1988). These forms are combined in women’s communities that focus on women’s bodies in a manner that subverts cultural norms and expectations. The benefits of an empowered physicality, following the model of Amazonian women, is that the unequal status of women is maintained in part by the physical superiority of men, by both the ideology of male superiority and the actual reality of male violence against women (Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). Increased physical strength impacts women’s minds and bodies, and is a strategy for more effectively resisting male domination (Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). Women’s fitness in general often has goals that focus on body appearance rather than engaging in resistance through taking pleasure in embodiment. Women who body build may be an exception to this (Bordo, 1988). As well, research has found that middle-aged women experience reduced body surveillance and shame, though they have similar control beliefs as younger women (McKinley,
45 2002). There are suggestions that with menopause, many women regain the authenticity of their pre-adolescent selves; when they are no longer beautiful objects whose goal is to cater to others, women may become more confident, self-directed, and energetic (Pipher, 1994). Murnen and Smolak (2009) studied whether feminist women were protected from body image problems due to a heightened ability to critique cultural pressures related to thinness. In their meta-analysis of 26 studies, they found that there was a positive significant association between feminist identity and body attitude that was strongest when older women participants were tested, when a more purposeful sample (e.g., women studies students, those interested in the topic, or lesbian women) were questioned, when body shame was the measure of body attitudes, and when feminist self-identification was incorporated into the measurement of feminist identity. There were also significant negative associations between feminist identity and other measures related to eating problems, and a lower drive for thinness. They concluded that a feminist identity probably exists among those who identify themselves as feminists and who have had a significant amount of experience with their feminist identity. This consolidated feminist identity helped protect the women in Murnen and Smolak’s study against extreme body dissatisfaction and the internalization of the thin ideal. 1.5.2.1. Groups designed to foster resistance. There are numerous programs that have been designed to foster resistance to rigid beauty standards, mostly within the domain of eating disorder prevention. Stice, Shaw, Burton, and Wade (2006) conducted a study of 481 high risk adolescent girls based on a prevention strategy using cognitive dissonance (CD), which targets the internalization of the female standard of beauty (specifically, the thin-ideal), as it is a risk factor for the development of eating disorders. In this approach, participants were encouraged to act and speak against the thin ideal, which in accordance with CD, aims to create an uncomfortable psychological state that is resolved by the
46 individual decreasing her investment in the thin ideal. Results of the study indicated that CD reduced thin-ideal internalization, body dissatisfaction, dieting, bulimic symptoms (one-year follow-up), binge eating (one-year follow-up), and negative effects compared to control conditions. Results were well maintained at the six-month follow-up. Becker, Ciao, and Smith (2008) chose to engage a broader social system of college/university sororities as participants and collaborators in an eating disorders prevention program. Over five years, they collaborated with campus sororities in the development of an evidence-based eating disorders prevention program that was peer led and tailored to the needs of the sorority. Other groups designed to foster resistance in women include outward-bound wilderness groups. For example, the course Women of Courage is intended for women who self-describe as survivors of abuse and includes either a backpacking or canoeing component, a solo camping experience, and the opportunity to rock climb (Kelly, 2006). Kelly (2006) described her experience in this wilderness program as involving self-discovery, appreciation of the natural wilderness, and a sense of physical and emotional accomplishment. Another example involving a physical emphasis was a ropes course training program (Hart & Silka, 1994). Indeed, there are many groups, organizations, and websites that devote time to resisting the dominant image of women’s appearance. For example, the Now Foundation sponsors a day of action to speak out against ads and images of women that it considers offensive, dangerous and disrespectful (Now Foundation, n.d.). Fat acceptance groups, such as The Shapelings, offer support through online communities (http://kateharding.net). 1.5.2.2. Health at Every Size. Another oppositional discourse to the expectation that women constantly strive to be slim comes from health experts. It is the Health At Every Size model (HAES), which challenges the value of promoting weight loss and focuses instead on weight-neutral health outcomes. The five
47 aspects of the HAES model are: body acceptance, eating behaviour, nutrition, activity, and social support. The focus is on targeting general well-being and enacting a positive, healthy, and satisfying lifestyle, with the goal of enhancing one’s awareness and knowledge of the biological, psychological, and sociocultural aspects of body weight. This is achieved through groups where the initial focus is on enhancing body- and self-acceptance, and participants are supported in leading a full life, regardless of their Body Mass Index (BMI). The goal is to first help participants disentangle feelings of self-worth from their weight. The eating behaviour component supports participants in letting go of restrictive eating behaviours and replacing them with internally regulated eating (in response to internal cues of hunger, satiety, and appetite). This evidence-based model advocates for a shift in both individuals and in the broader health care paradigm, from a weight loss focus to a HAES focus (Bacon & Aphramor, 2011). Participants are educated in techniques that allow them to become more sensitized to internal cues and to decrease their vulnerability to external cues. The nutrition component educates participants about standard nutrition information and the effects of food choices on one’s well-being. It supports them in making food choices that honour good health and also reflects individual dietary preferences. The activity component helps participants identify and transform barriers to becoming active (e.g., attitudes towards their bodies), and to find activities and habits that allow them to enjoy their bodies. The support group element was designed to help participants see their common experiences in a culture that devalues large women, and to gain support and learn strategies for asserting themselves and effecting change. Key differences between this model and standard diet models reflect the understanding that dieters are encouraged to increase their cognitive restraint to decrease energy intake, while HAES participants are encouraged to decrease their restraint, relying instead on intuitive regulation. Second, the HAES model supports participants in accepting their size, whereas in the diet model,
48 reduction in size (weight loss) is emphasized (Bacon, 2010; Bacon, Stern, Van Loan, & Keim, 2005; Provencher et al., 2009). In a six-month, randomized study of fat, White, female chronic dieters aged 30 to 45 years (N_78), with two-year follow-up, Bacon and her associates (2005) compared HAES and diet programs, and found that HAES group members maintained their weight, and improved in all outcome variables (and sustained these improvements), including metabolic fitness as measured by blood pressure and blood lipids, total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, systolic blood pressure, pathological eating behaviour, self-esteem, depression, and body image. In contrast, while diet group participants lost weight and showed initial improvements in outcome variables in year one, the weight was regained and other improvements were not sustained. Thus, encouraging size acceptance, reduced dieting behaviour, and heightened awareness and response to body signals resulted in improved health risk indicators. Some health care practitioners fear that HAES will result in indiscriminate eating and increased weight; however, the two-year data in the Bacon et al. (2005) study indicates that this is not the case. The HAES group also demonstrated an improvement in self-esteem, and 100% of participants reported that their involvement in the program helped them feel better about themselves (compared with 47% of the diet group). The diet group, on the other hand, demonstrated initial improvement followed by a significant worsening of self-esteem at followup. This damage to self-esteem was also discernable in other self-evaluation questions; for example, 53% of participants in the diet group expressed feelings of failure compared with 0% of HAES participants. The diet group’s change in weight exhibited the pattern of a decrease in weight by the program’s conclusion, then a gradual regaining of lost weight, while the HAES group members maintained their weight throughout the study. The fact that the improvements in health risk indicators occurred during relative weight stability demonstrates that improvements in
49 metabolic functioning can occur through behaviour change, independent of a change in weight. Given the well-documented near-impossibility of sustaining weight loss, this is a particularly important result, and provides further support for practitioners in redirecting clients toward behaviour change as opposed to a primary focus on weight (Bacon et al., 2005). The findings of Provencher et al. (2009) support these results, with their randomized control study (N_144) that found that randomly assigned HAES and social support groups resulted in better outcomes than matched control groups, in which women were wait-listed and instructed to follow their usual lifestyle habits for the duration of the study. Recognizing that dieting does not result in the maintenance of weight loss or reduced risk of health problems, and that failure at dieting reduces quality of life for fat women, research (Ciliska, 1998) has found that a 12-week group intervention for fat women was effective in reducing body dissatisfaction, reducing depression, and increasing social adjustment, while improving self-esteem and encouraging a non-dieting/non-restrained pattern of eating, with no intended changes in weight. Other research (Hawley et al., 2008) has found that fat women can reduce stress and improve psychological well-being and medical symptoms through relaxation strategies. 1.6. The Construct of Joy Psychological literature tends to focus on negative experiences and pathology, and thus there is a gap in the psychological literature with regards to positive experiences and positive emotions—particularly joy (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006; Dick-Niederhauser, 2009; Fredrickson, 2006; Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). According to positive psychologists, people need to cultivate hope for a better life and find ways to increase their levels of satisfaction; understanding more about positive emotions may be one route to achieving this (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006). Positive emotions, including joy, are important to psychology because they may be viewed as markers of
50 optimal well-being that both signal and produce optimal functioning. Additionally, both serve as an end state and a means to achieving psychological growth (Fredrickson, 2006). However, “we know practically nothing about the processes through which people derive joy in their lives” (Bryant & Veroff, 2007, p. 3). There are varying definitions of joy. Researchers note a lack of clarity in how to define joy and how to distinguish it from other positive emotions, such as love. Some argue that joy cannot be defined beyond limited constructs within current parameters and using known characteristics; however, developing a clearer, empirically grounded and experiential understanding of joy may result in greater ease in assessing what contributes to joy, as well as the function of joy (Liston, 2001; Robbins, 2006). The word joy originates from the French joie, which has a Latin root of gaudium, or gaudy—something flashy and to be hidden, which may explain why children’s expressions of joy in western culture are more acceptable than adults’ expressions of joy (Liston, 2001). It also comes from the Greek ganustuai—to rejoice—which originates from ganos, a bright, inner, profound light that is not superficial but radiates from the human spirit (Liston, 2001). This is in contrast to happiness, which is a reaction to an external event that happens to us, as reflected in the word origin of happy from the Greek hap, to mean happening. Similarly, ecstasy is linked to histani—to displace one from one’s self (Liston, 2001). These word origins may allow for insight into the original meaning of joy, and differences between joy and other emotional experiences. In a dialectical, hermeneutic, phenomenological study, Robbins (2006), outlined the evidence for theories of subjective well-being and joy, and noted there was little information on the experiential structure of joy and the individual experience of joy. Robbins looked at the experience of joy in three participants, through a number of research methods including:
51 drawing, body mapping, interviews, role-playing, and written work. Robbins found that when joyful, the person is forgotten; as the self is immersed in an experiential world with a feeling of fulfilment in the present. Qualities associated with joy include warmth, creativity, and harmony, as well as a sense of promise that, though one is in the present moment, there is hope for the future (Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). Desire is often related to joy as well, which Liston (2001), described as meaningful experience and a “constant opening of ever expanding ‘unboundedness’” (p. 27). At times, joy has been linked to those who perceive themselves to be making progress towards a personal goal (Izard, 1977). Though other researchers describe joy as not being linked to achieving an instrumental task or appraisal, but as being oriented to a state of play and openness to possibility (Robbins, 2006). Joy is, along with other positive emotions, related to an increase in innovative thinking, flexibility, creativity, and receptivity, while responding to a world that is “freely accepted as it is” (Robbins, 2006, p. 182). Joy has been described as an independent awareness based in internal self-reflection (Liston, 2001). Joy can also be viewed as a way of approaching the world, a state of awareness in which one is open to the possibility of exchange between the self and the world, enabling us to “view ourselves as embodied spiritual beings” (Liston, 2001, p. 21). Liston (2001) described the way that joy has enabled her to reject dualism and discover a unified body/spirit perspective while encompassing the breadths of human potential. Myers (1992) noted that well-being and subjective well-being involve a pervasive sense that life is good. Joy for some is “not ephemeral euphoria, but a deep and abiding sense that… all is… well” (Myers, 1992, p. 23). In Meadow’s (1975) study of the Joy Scale (N-333), constructed of items which aimed to describe the phenomenology of joy, he found that there was a social dimension of joy, which is reflected in the many reported instances of joy that involved meaningful love, interpersonal, and
52 sexual relationships. Joy was experienced as a highly pleasurable emotion, involving high activation, in which the person was inclined towards affiliative social relationships, and the self was experienced as the centre of power and vitality. Meadow’s Joy Typology focused on pairs of experientially opposite categories, which were identified as useful for distinguishing different types of joy: (a) Activeness vs. passiveness, (b) Individuation vs. affiliation, and (c) Excitement vs. serenity. In research on positive emotions, Fredrickson (2006) described joy as being adaptive because it helped build one’s physical, intellectual, and social resources. Fredrickson developed an alternative model for positive emotions in general, though not solely related to joy, in which positive emotions broadened people’s momentary thought-action repertoires, and also built their enduring personal resources. In Fredrickson and Joiner’s (2002) study, 138 college students completed self-report measures of affect and coping at two assessment periods, five weeks apart. Analysis showed that positive affect and broad-minded coping serially enhanced one another. This supports Fredrickson’s general broaden-and-build theory, which predicted that positive emotions would accumulate and become compounded. The psychological broadening sparked by one positive emotion increased the odds that an individual would find positive meaning in subsequent events, as well as experience additional positive emotions. In another study, Cohn, Fredrickson, Brown, Mikels, and Conway (2009) measured emotions daily for one month in a sample of 86 students and assessed life satisfaction and trait resilience at the beginning and end of the month. Positive emotions predicted increases in both resilience and life satisfaction. Negative emotions had weak or null effects and did not interfere with the benefits of the positive emotions. Change in resilience mediated the relation between positive emotions and increased life satisfaction. This study suggested that happy people became
53 more satisfied not simply because they felt better, but because they developed resources for living well. Fredrickson, Mancuso, Branigan, and Tugade (2000) found that positive emotion was a high activation state, which had the capacity to undo the lingering cardiovascular after-effects of negative emotions. In researching this, Fredrickson et al. studied 166 participants who experienced an anxiety-induced cardiovascular reactivity by viewing a film that elicited contentment, amusement, neutrality, or sadness. Films that elicited contentment and amusement produced faster cardiovascular recovery than neutral or sad films. Participants in a second study (N_185) viewed these same films following a neutral state. The researchers found that cardiovascular effects of positive emotions appeared to emerge only when negative emotions had already generated cardiovascular reactivity. Though these studies were not intended to address joy independent of other positive emotions, it appears possible that an upward spiral can, over time, build psychological resources, and that this building may also pertain to the impact of joy. Kast (1991) argued the importance of studying joy, as joy shared with others has the capacity to build bridges. It “gives us the strength… to face our difficulties realistically… to see the oasis of happiness where they appear in the landscape of our life stories, and to give due weight to our capacity in spite of everything, to take deep delight” (Kast, 1991, p. 157). 1.6.1. Research on Women’s Experiences of Embodied Joy. As previously addressed, there is a wealth of theoretical material regarding women’s body experiences and a wealth of research material regarding women’s body dissatisfaction; however, there is a lack of research on women’s experiences of embodied joy. Much of the research is focused on body image. Kennedy’s (1994) qualitative dissertation research explored positive body image in a naturalistic inquiry involving three studies with a maximum of five women in each study. Participants ranged in age from 21 to their late 60s. Criteria included
54 women who were highly physically active and were defined as successful by others. Kennedy’s participants struggled to be aware of specific details of the feeling of well-being, and feeling good was linked to a sense of physical proficiency as a result of faster times in exercise training. Participants accepted their physical selves through slimness. Additionally, her questions focused exclusively on the functional dimension of the body, rather than on body awareness. Kennedy found that participants felt a loss of self-consciousness in their bodies when they focused not on themselves but on an activity. Mohr’s (2005) qualitative dissertation studied women’s process of developing positive body image. Mohr used auto-ethnography and interviews as primary methods, and focused on body image as it specifically related to weight and size. Her participants included women who identified as having been diagnosed with an eating disorder, as well as three fat activists; 10 out of 11 of her participants identified as feminist. Mohr noted that both positive and negative factors contributed to participants’ body image. 1.7. Rationale for the Current Study The current study is a qualitative investigation of an area that has rarely been examined in research with women: the experience of embodied joy. Specifically, the goal was to explore women’s self-defined joyful body experiences, rather than experiences defined as positive as a result of following cultural scripts and expectations (such as attempting to attain thinness). The study therefore included the examination of resistance to cultural scripts. The choice of an emergent qualitative approach related to the limited knowledge there is in the field, as well as the wish to validate and amplify women’s voices. With regards to embodiment, feminist writers have advocated for the study of women’s embodiment and embodied practices in order to generate further research-based understandings of diverse women’s experiences in relation to their bodies and to the prevailing culture (Blood,
55 2005; Bordo, 1997; Piran & Teall, 2012). The current study responds to these calls for further research, and positions participants in an embodied stance. In terms of constructs of femininity, cultural expectations create habits and ways of life for women, constituted by discourses and practices, with women learning what behaviours are required during a particular time in a particular culture in order for women’s bodies to be framed as anything other than deficient. These discourses do not solely define women’s experiences. However, within this paradigm, women are focussed on thinness, weight loss, and the docility of female bodies; self-castigation and a focus on appearance result in bodily alienation, as well as both physical and psychological damage, while excluding the authentic self (Bacon, 2010; Bacon & Aphramor, 2011; Bartky, 1988; Bartky, 1990; Bordo, 1997; Diprose, 1994; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; McKinley, 2002; Pipher, 1994; Rodin et al., 1985; Wolf, 1991). The current study problematizes these experiences and addresses places of resistance to them. Similarly, with regards to body dissatisfaction, women are conditioned to be hateful towards their bodies, stigmatizing fat and enacting bodily control (Bartky, 1990; Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994; Harrison & Fredrickson, 2003; Mckinley, 2002; Quinn et al., 2006; Rodin et al., 1985; Szekely, 1988; Thompson, 1994; Waller & Shaw, 1994). Women’s objectification and internalization of this objectification is problematic and is promoted by media images (Bordo, 1988; Farrell, 2011; Rodin et al., 1985; Szekely, 1988; Thompson, 1994). The perception of women’s sexual appetites and hunger as uncontrollable is intended to constrain women and purge much of their power (Bordo, 1988; Bordo, 1997; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). The focus on bodily transformation and control may be understood as a form of social control, though actual power and self-esteem cannot be attained through bodily constriction (Diprose, 1994; Szekely, 1988, Wolf, 1991). However, some women are able to resist this cultural dictate of bodily dissatisfaction. Indeed, there have been calls for empirical studies to address this
56 resistance, and to create a clear understanding of this resistance (Davis, 1997; Young, 2005). Both individual resistance and broader strategies of resistance have been framed as necessary, with a focus on the practical lives of bodies, or praxis, as a route to rebellion, protest, and bodily repossession (Bordo, 1997; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998; Davis, 1997; Rich, 1976; Sawicki, 1988; Weiss & Haber, 1999). The intent of the present research is to provide empirical evidence for this resistance while addressing praxis. With regards to joy, there is a gap in the psychological literature regarding positive emotions—particularly joy—and there is a lack of empirical research regarding joy as a form of resistance (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006; Dick-Niederhauser, 2009; Fredrickson, 2006; Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). Much of the literature posits that women generally direct their struggles internally, onto themselves and their bodies, and that resistance would involve refusal to accept those characterizations, as women do experience pleasure in their bodies. Theories regarding how to attain resistance include possibilities related to transforming one’s relationship with food, self-gentleness, positive experiences, celebration, and embracing the self (Bell, 1993; Bartky, 1990; Bordo, 1997; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Lorde, 1990; Main & Kelly, 2005; Millman, 1991; Pipher, 1994; Sawicki, 1988; Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991; Young, 2005). In order to attend to embodied experiences, focussing on other senses beyond being seen has also been proposed as a place of resistance (Inckle, 2007). Joy may potentially disrupt the status quo of problematic body expectations, given that joy may be a route to eradicating internalized oppression. Indeed, joy may both signal and produce optimal well-being, and may build physical, intellectual, and social resources (Fredrickson, 2006; Fredrickson et al., 2000). As such, joy may present a potential route to resistance against bodily dissatisfaction (Bordo, 1988; Dews, 1984; Shroff, 1993; Wolf, 1991). However, there is a lack of research regarding both women’s embodied experiences and
57 women’s experiences of joy. The present study aims to bridge this gap in the research literature, and to explore the potential of joy as a route to resisting bodily dissatisfaction.
Chapter Two – Methodology The present study included interviews with 13 women as well as a focus group on the issue of joyful body experiences. The purpose of this study was to explore women’s embodied joyful experiences, which are framed as acts of resistance as they occur within a cultural milieu that expects bodily dissatisfaction in women related to body shape, size, and appearance. Given the breadth of experiences covered and the lack of knowledge regarding women’s lived joyful body experiences, a qualitative methodology was used that allowed for both an exploration and an in-depth examination of the elements that impacted upon women’s joyful body experiences. According to Denzin and Lincoln (2008), qualitative research “is a situated activity that locates the observer in the world. It consists of a set of interpretive, material practices that make the world visible. These practices transform the world. They turn the world into a series of representations” (p. 3). Denzin and Lincoln describe the qualitative researcher using multiple images—images that they identify as gendered, including social critic, jazz musician, and quilt maker. They note that qualitative researchers utilize interpretive practices while attempting to gain greater understanding through a creative process that strives to bring “psychological and emotional unity—a pattern—to an interpretive experience” (p. 5). Denzin and Lincoln identify qualitative research as moving “from the personal to the political, from the local to the historical and the cultural. These are dialogical texts” (p. 5). 2.1. Feminist Research Methods Grossman et al. (1997), outlined the primary principles behind feminist research as: purposefully illuminating the lives of women while utilizing feminist values, with any method being potentially applicable; exploitative or oppressive relationships are expressly rejected; feminist research is potentially transformative to “traditional psychology…epistemologies…
58
59 women’s lives including the transformation of participants’ and researchers’ lives” (p. 81); traditional structural obstacles remain, however, new opposition may be created. Central tenets of a feminist method (Gergen, 1988, as articulated by Riger, 2000) include: 1. Recognizing the interdependence of researcher and subject. 2. Avoiding the decontextualizing of the subject or experimenter from their social and historical surroundings. 3. Recognizing and revealing the nature of one’s values within the research context; accepting that facts do not exist independently of their producers’ linguistic codes. 4. Demystifying the role of the scientists and establishing an egalitarian relationship between science makers and science consumers. Riger (2000) stated that, “a feminist method should produce a study not just of women, but also for women” (p. 20). Research for women involves conscious subjectivity, in which the experience of each participating woman is validated and acknowledged (Duelli Klein, 1983). Feminist methodologists posit that human behaviour is shaped by social, political, and historical context. Ultimately, feminist research is a tool in the struggle for women’s emancipation and for social change (Ali, 2006; Mies, 1983). Indeed, “science is power, for all research findings have political implications. There is no value-free science” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008, p. 5). In contrast to other approaches, many feminist researchers reflect that there is not one specific set of techniques that delineates feminist methods. Rather, feminist research is intended to “be informed by, and to inform, feminist thought and practice” (Grossman et al., 1997, p. 77). However, Reinharz (1992) stated that interviews were the principal method of feminist research, as interviewing offers access to participants’ thoughts in their own words, and allows for the active involvement of participants.
60 Fine and Merle Gordon (1989), while pointing out that any method can distort gender if power asymmetries, context, and meaning are not examined, advocated the use of novel methodologies to learn about women’s lives. They suggested focusing on relationships, studying contradictions and pressures in social existence, addressing contradictions within feminist politics, and addressing issues that were not being studied in other projects. Other feminist researchers have argued that no specific method is inherently more feminist than any other; rather, all methods must be used critically, and the limitations of each method must be addressed (Grossman et al., 1997; Peplau & Conrad, 1989). Peplau and Conrad (1989) studied materials from a conference of the Association for Women in Psychology, in which they analyzed 41 proposals for a future conference. They found that feminist psychologists defined their own work as feminist based not on the methods that they used, but on their use of feminist theory, the issues they chose to investigate, and their commitment to non-sexist research; any method has the potential to produce feminist knowledge (Grossman et al., 1997). Riger (2000) outlined problems with commonly used methods in feminist research, including: the manipulation of friendship in the service of research, the risk of exploitation, betrayal, or abandonment by the researcher, the dilemma of whose interpretations would be privileged when participants want analysis of their experience but disagree with the researcher’s analysis, and the difficulty of creating social change. Riger concluded that while feminist values were themselves contested, feminist research methods have overcome some of the limitations of traditional social science, while also raising additional limitations and concerns about adherence with feminist values. Feminism may be most useful as a set of questions that “challenges the prevailing asymmetries of power and androcentric assumptions in science and society—rather than as a basis for a unique method” (Riger, 2000, p. 21). Epistemological concerns have also
61 been the basis of critiques of feminist theory as reifying gender rather than challenging patriarchal representations of gender (Cosgrove, 2002; Cosgrove, 2003). With regards to the development of language for feminist research, such as referring to those in a study by using the term participant rather than subject, language may be a reflection of feminist research, as “participants participate and thus are active agents; subjects, in contrast. are objects studied by the researcher” (Grossman et al., 1997, p. 78). Attempts to demystify research subvert the traditional paradigm in which the researcher is the expert and the authority, and the researched person has their knowledge appropriated with little input (Riger, 2000). Code (1991) noted that typical research subjects have been tacitly assumed to be male, adult, White, reasonably affluent, educated, and of status, and women have been overtly excluded; “women have been judged incapable, for many reasons, of achieving knowledge” (pp. 8-9). Code reflected upon epistemological dichotomies in relation to feminist research, whereby: The sex of the knower is epistemologically significant introduces a subjective factor—a factor that pertains to the specific, subjective “nature” and circumstances of knowers… Hence it amounts to a claim that knowledge is indeed both subjective and objective… dissolution—a deconstruction—of the traditional objective/subjective dichotomy. (p. 27) Magnusson and Marecek (2012) have recently outlined constructionist theories of gender in psychology, particularly feminist theories which “embed the individual fully in ongoing social life” (p. 28), in order to note the variety of ways pervasive gender imperatives are enacted while utilizing language that is intended to theorize “inequality, power, and subordination” (p. 28). Magnusson and Marecek emphasize that, “psychologists risk psychologizing phenomena that are social and cultural in origin” (p. 34). However, researchers must assume that “people’s knowledge of the world is always a social product” (Magnusson & Marecek, 2012, p. 47), and all phenomena are given meaning within the larger social context.
62 With regards to post-structuralist and post-modernist perspectives, Denzin and Lincoln (2008) posit that, “There are no objective observations, only observations socially situated in the worlds of—and between—the observer and the observed” (p. 12). As well, “All research is interpretive; it is guided by the researcher’s set of beliefs and feelings about the world and how it should be understood and studied” (Denzin and Lincoln, 2008, p. 13). According to Weedon’s (2004) conceptualization of feminist practice and poststructuralist theory, “different realities exist for different individuals… women’s realities differ from those of men” (p. 8). Weedon posited that it was essential to theorize relationships between experience, social power, and resistance, and that researchers must be attuned to the forms of oppression that divide women, in addition to those that women share; feminist perspectives are marginalized, but offer discursive space for resistance. Weedon proposed post-structuralism as containing possibilities for change, requiring acknowledgement that “meaning is always political” (p. 134). Feminist theorists generally agree that there is an interactive process inherent to research. Denzin and Lincoln (2008) note that research is shaped by the researcher’s “own personal history, biography, gender, social class, race, and ethnicity, and by those of the people in the setting… qualitative research, accordingly, is the world of lived experience, for this is where individual belief and action intersect with culture” (p. 5). Accordingly, “the gendered, multiculturally situated researcher approaches the world with a set of ideas, a framework (theory, ontology) that specifies a set of questions (epistemology) that he or she then examines in specific ways (methodology, analysis)” (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008, p. 11). 2.1.1. Indigenous Feminism and Critical Race Feminism. Denzin and Lincoln (2008) stated that qualitative research “serves as a metaphor for colonial knowledge, for power, and for truth” (p. 437). Green (2007) outlined the ways in which
63 Indigenous feminists have provided “a critique of colonialism, decolonization, and gendered and raced power relations in both settler and Indigenous communities” (p. 21). This Indigenous feminist perspective has incorporated feminism’s focus on gender and the importance of women’s emancipation. In addition, the Indigenous feminist perspective is a social movement dedicated to praxis via action and transformation through both theoretical and practical engagement with issues related to both historical politics and current social, cultural, and political issues. Indigenous feminism has integrated the feminist perspective with anti-colonial political struggles focused on contesting the “justifications of the economic and political status quo of settler states and demands restitution, self-determination and participation in political and economic activity” (Green, 2007, p. 22). Indigenous feminism has sought an Indigenous liberation that includes women—both women who conform and women who are marginalized. It is an ideological framework for both intellectuals and activists, whereby power structures and practices in both dominant and indigenous institutions are critically addressed (Green, 2007). Indigenous research is committed to social justice and transformation through anti-oppressive research (Potts & Brown, 2005). The work of Indigenous feminism is based in “praxis—theoretically informed, politically selfconscious activism…. It is principled, self-reflective and critical” (Green, 2007, pp. 25-26). Indigenous feminism is: A libratory critical theoretical approach, fitting comfortably with feminist and post-colonial thought and critical race theory. As a set of political analyses and practices, Indigenous feminism is a part of the broad and deep stream of feminist activism, wherein theory fuses with strategic action and solidarities. (Green, 2007, p. 30) Ultimately, Indigenous feminism invites feminists to “deeply embrace the Other, who is after all… Ourself” (Stewart-Harawira, 2007, p. 136).
64 With regards to Indigenous research ethics, the structures that have allowed researchers to take from Indigenous communities are in parallel to Indigenous communities’ relationships with settlers (Kovach, 2009). Indigenous research ethics aim to decolonize this research process (Kovach, 2009). Indigenous perspectives disallow the separation of ethics from the entirety of research whereby values and ethics are connected, with research ethics developed collaboratively within Indigenous communities, while recognizing that each community has different perspectives (Ermine, Sinclair, & Browne, 2005). Research occurs within the context of Indigenous worldviews that respect “relationship, reciprocity, collectivism, and sacred knowledges” (Kovach, 2009, p. 146). Many non-Indigenous ethical standards are considered cross culturally appropriate, including informed consent—though within Indigenous communities, these ethics are considered relational, including creating relationships throughout the entirety of the research, with trust being earned in part through a willingness to give back to the community and utilize shared information in a helpful way, often through knowledge sharing and the dissemination of the research in accessible and useful ways (Kovach, 2005; Kovach, 2009). The Indigenous feminist perspective is complemented by Hill Collins’ (2000) work on Black feminist thought: By embracing a paradigm of intersecting oppressions of race, class, gender, sexuality, and nation, as well as Black women’s individual and collective agency within them, Black feminist thought reconceptualizes the social relations of domination and resistance… activating epistemologies that criticize prevailing knowledge and that enable us to define our own realities on our own terms has far greater implications. (pp. 273-274) Hill Collins posited that change resulted from human agency, and Black women’s opposition to oppression has been a lived reality. Hill Collins noted that, “U.S. Black women’s efforts to grapple with the effects of domination in everyday life are evident in our creation of safe spaces that enable us to resist oppression” (p. 274). As each individual Black woman:
65 changes her ideas and actions, so does the overall shape of power itself change… these micro-changes may remain invisible to individual woman. Yet collectively, they can have a profound impact…. As people push against, step away from, and sift the terms of their participation in power relations, the shape of power relations changes for everyone. Like individual subjectivity, resistance strategies and power are always multiple and are in constant states of change. (p. 275) This Black feminist perspective is particularly related to groups engaged in social justice, whereby dialectical approaches address self-defined, group-based standpoints that can “foster the type of group solidarity necessary for resisting oppressions. In contrast, subjectivity approaches emphasize how domination and resistance shape and are shaped by individual agency” (p. 275). The Indigenous and Black feminist perspectives are germane to the current research, given the importance of an intersectional approach, which is often absent from feminist research. Beyond their common identification as women, the current study attempted to acknowledge participant’s diverse identities through an intersectional approach, which respects women’s positionality as members of a variety of social groups, some of which experience marginalization. This contextualizing is imperative given the complexity of experiences of identity (Cosgrove, 2002). Hill Collins (2000) clarifies the importance of ground level resistance, and the present study documents the resistance that occurs in daily practices. As well, community organizing is a key focus of Indigenous feminist thought, and is addressed in the present study (Kovach, 2005; Kovach, 2009). Thereby, the current study addresses both individual agency and practices as a route to resistance, and also incorporates the value of groups that are oriented towards broader social change. Additionally, Indigenous research ethics indicate that the research project should benefit participants (Kovach, 2005, Kovach, 2009), and the present research validated participants’ experiences and helped them to clarify their own experiences and beliefs; following the interviews, several participants contacted the researcher, expressing appreciation for the opportunity to share their experiences, and the belief that the research would help other girls and
66 women. Future plans for the present research reflect Indigenous feminist research ethics regarding sharing research knowledge in helpful ways, with a goal of furthering social justice (Green, 2007; Potts & Brown, 2005). 2.2. Constructivist Grounded Theory In addition to utilizing the perspectives of feminist research theories and methods, the current study employed a grounded theory methodology for the purpose of data analysis. Glaser and Strauss (1967) developed grounded theory as an alternative form of theory construction, whereby researchers engage in “the discovery of theory from data” (p. 2). Grounded theory utilizes the constant comparative method, in which the researcher “generates conceptual categories or their properties from evidence; then the evidence from which the category emerged is used to illustrate the concept” (Glaser & Strauss, 1967, p. 23). It is noteworthy that this method of analysis implies a situated analyst: The constant comparative method is not designed (as methods of quantitative analysis are) to guarantee that two analysts working independently with the same data will achieve the same results; it is designed to allow, with discipline, for some of the vagueness and flexibility that aid the creative generation of theory. (Glaser & Strauss, 1967, p. 103) Glaser and Strauss’s constant comparative method is intended to generate and plausibly suggest (but not provisionally test) many categories, properties, and hypotheses about general problems. With regards to the process of engaging in grounded theory, “the analyst starts by coding each incident in his data into as many categories of analysis as possible” (Glaser & Strauss, 1967, p. 105). The defining rule for the constant comparative method is, “while coding an incident for a category, compare it with the previous incidents in the same and different groups coded in the same category” (Glaser and Strauss, 1967, p. 106).
67 Charmaz’s (2006/2010) constructivist approach to grounded theory describes grounded theory as an interpretive portrayal of the studied work, whereby “rich data get beneath the surface of social and subjective life” (2010, p. 13). Charmaz (1994) notes that: Coding, the initial phase of the analytic method, is simply the process of categorizing and sorting data. Codes then serve as shorthand devices to label, separate, compile, and organize data. Codes range from simple, concrete, and topical categories to more general, abstract, conceptual categories for an emerging theory. (p. 97, emphasis in original) The researcher constructs codes by actively naming the data. Coding is a two-phase process: initially, researchers look for what they can define and they “make discoveries” (Charmaz, 2010, p. 70) in the data, then through focused line-by-line coding, the researcher engages in initial coding, focused coding, axial coding, and theoretical coding (Charmaz, 2010). The primary guideline for grounded theory is to “study your emerging data” (Charmaz, 1994, p. 100). Charmaz utilizes an interpretive definition of theory as understanding rather than explanation, which assumes emergent multiple realities, and understands knowledge as situated and located. Constructivist participants construct meaning embedded in larger networks, while the researcher attains successive levels of abstraction through comparative analysis (Charmaz, 1994). Grounded theory is described as phenomenological by Charmaz (1994), who critiques Glazer and Strauss as implying that “the data speak for themselves” (p. 113) and the “partly objectivist view of the researcher’s role” (p. 113). 2.2.1. Relevance of a Feminist-Constructivist-Grounded Theory Frame to the Current Study. Principles of feminist research and grounded theory have informed this study. The research question is feminist in nature, focusing on women’s lived experiences. Methods of feminist research seek to reduce power differences between researcher and participant. Accordingly, the present study sought to reduce these power differences as much as possible,
68 focused on women’s comfort, safety, and respect for participant’s boundaries. An element of attending to this power difference was the researcher’s decision to self-disclose and respond openly when participants directly enquired as to the researcher’s interest in the subject matter, experiences with joyful body experiences, and experiences with oppression or resistance. However, in order to maintain focus on the participants’ lived experiences, these queries were attended to at the end of the interviews, with the exception of the focus group, whereby questions were responded to in the moment. A feminist research approach was necessary to understand and interpret the context of participants’ experiences with joyful body experiences. During the present study, the full context of women’s lives included the ways in which participants’ social location impacted their experiences, with social location including gender, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, disability, ethnocultural identity, relationship status, immigration experiences, body size, and a host of other factors. An essential component of feminist research is the description of research participants’ lived experiences in relationships with others (Szekely, 1988). Feminist social scientists must locate themselves in descriptions of actual people in tangible situations, as it is important to understand how women’s daily lived experiences occur, and how these daily lived experiences in the body are intertwined with social relationships (Szekely, 1988). An element often missing from mainstream psychology research is the reality of women’s lives, as women themselves define their experiences. One of the purposes of feminist research is to free women’s voices from the dominant context, which derives power from women’s silence (Bristow & Esper, 1980). Interviewing women is a “strategy for documenting women’s accounts of their lives” (Oakley, 1981, p. 48), and importantly, it is a “tool for making possible the articulated and recorded
69 commentary of women on the very personal business of being female in a patriarchal capitalist society” (Oakley, 2005, p. 225). It is insufficient to study culture alone; we must also research the practical lives of women and women’s bodies, to avoid presenting misleading information (Bordo, 1997). However, there is an absence of writing on women’s body experiences (Young, 2005). Feminist psychological theory in particular has been critiqued for neglecting to provide a coherent framework to understand the ways that women’s bodies do not simply passively respond to social and psychological influences (Szekely, 1988). Grosz (1993) posited that knowledge requires the interaction of power and bodies. Phenomenological accounts based on experience are an important element of research (Birke, 1999). Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (Smith, Flowers, & Larkin, 2009) explores lived experience and examines how people make sense of their major life experiences. Work that focuses solely on the ways in which gender is produced through cultural practices loses the importance of women’s lived experience of embodiment, whereas exclusive focus on women’s bodies as passive recipients of cultural practices denies the agency and the woman’s lived experience of being in that body (Birke, 1999). Feminist work must bridge this mind-body problem and address the ways that women’s commonly shared problems are bodily experiences (Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998). Natural science methodology does not allow for exploration of how individual women perceive their bodies (Kennedy 1994). Similarly, cognitive process can at times be divorced from actual participants’ lived experiences (Szekely, 1988). However, the interview provides a context of relational human interaction, whereby the participants are enabled to articulate their complex, lived experiences (Becker, 1986 in Kennedy, 1994).
70 Describing with some accuracy the ways that experiences impact women requires contesting the official story about how things are supposed to appear (Bartky, 1990). There must be a unity to the story that reflects the unity of the experience; given that body experiences are multidimentional, the concept of body image does not capture the complexity of body experiences (Fisher, 1986). Additionally, in contrast to literature on negative life events, the work on positive experiences is sparse (Lyubomirsky, Sousa, & Dickerhoof, 2006). It is important to learn what processes maintain and stimulate positive feelings, and accompany the re-experiencing and processing of happy events; Lyubomirsky et al. (2006) studied self-reports spoken into a tape recorder, and concluded that similar knowledge may help to relieve suffering. With regards to the feminist goal of empowering women, repetitive thoughts about happy experiences can help to maintain positive emotions, and thinking while replaying a happy day results in enhanced longterm positive affect including a feeling of personal growth, and increased general health and physical functioning (Lyubomirsky et al., 2006). Therefore, engagement in the current study had the potential to enhance participants’ well-being through increased positive affect. 2.3. Modes of Inquiry Two approaches were used for the collection of data in this study: individual interviews, and a focused group discussion. Both of these methods are explored below. 2.3.1. Individual Interview. One open-ended semi structured interview (Appendix A) was conducted with each participant in order to investigate the ways in which women experienced joy and pleasure in their bodies, while resisting the dominant cultural script of body dissatisfaction. The purpose of the interview was to understand “the experience of other people and the meaning they make of that experience” (Seidman, 1991, p. 3), with the recognition that open-ended interviews can unearth
71 information that allows for a deeper understanding of the participant’s story (Ely, 1991). Following the interview, participants completed a short demographic questionnaire (Appendix B). The interview was structured in such a way that the set questions were addressed, while participants were able to explore any issues that they wanted to discuss in more detail. This approach enabled participants to co-construct the interview in a way that fit with their understandings of the topic. The purpose of this data collection was to obtain detailed information on women’s experiences. According to Seidman (1991), “interviewing allows us to put behaviour in context and provides access to understanding their action” (p. 4). The interview questions addressed participants’ interest in the study and questions that related to the women’s positive body experiences, as well as prompts within the broader questions (see Appendix A). Participants were given ample opportunity to raise and discuss any issue that they felt was relevant. A transcription of the interview was completed, and participants were offered a copy of the transcription as well as a summary for optional commentary. Three participants requested changes to the summary or transcript. The changes included: one clarification of the amount of time spent living in rural and urban environments; one clarification of the participant’s mother’s ethnic identity; and one participant requested that several potentially identifying examples that were critical of friends and family members be removed from the transcript. All changes were completed in the final transcript and summary. All participants replied approving the transcript of their interview and summary of the transcript. 2.3.2. The Focus Group. Focus groups involve communication between participants in order to generate data (Kitzinger, 1995). Indeed, the group interaction is a part of the method, as it provides the opportunity to examine what participants think, study women’s experiences, and examine how
72 their thoughts and experiences develop within a cultural context (Kitzinger, 1995). This is achieved through open-ended questions, which enable the researcher to explore areas of importance, while allowing participants to pursue their own priorities in their own vocabulary (Kitzinger, 1995). Focus groups were originally based in marketing research (Barbour, 2005; Maguire, 1987). However, this method is shifting from opinion-based data towards a participatory model of group exploration, with an emphasis on consciousness-raising, empowerment, and transformation (Maguire, 1987; Wilkinson, 1999). The everyday language and interaction among participants can take the research in new and unexpected directions, tapping into dimensions that conventional data collection might not while highlighting the research goals through participants’ humour, consensus, and dissent (Kitzinger, 1995). Focus groups have been described as an inherently flexible method (Barbour, 2005). Focus groups are particularly sensitive to cultural variables and may facilitate discussion of taboo topics; participants are able to provide each other with mutual support for expressing feelings that are common to the group, but which deviate from the mainstream. Participants are encouraged to engage with one another, formulate ideas, and articulate thoughts that were previously unarticulated (Kitzinger, 1995). For this reason, it is a popular method for use with social action and empowerment-based research (Kitzinger, 1995). As well, group members can develop and reinforce their perspectives by talking to others with similar experiences (Kitzinger, 1995). According to Kitzinger (1995), focus groups can enable the research to move from individual psychology towards broader structural solutions. As such, focus groups are an appropriate method for feminist research, given that their non-hierarchical structure enables a reduction of the researcher’s power and control, with more opportunities for participants to set the research agenda for themselves.
73 Engaging in group discussions around issues that are typically viewed as individual can help participants to develop their critical awareness of important social issues impacting their own lives, and provide them with a better understanding of their social realities (Eldon & Levin, 1991). By exploring everyday experiences and treating them as meaningful and worthy of attention in a group setting, commonalities begin to emerge. These commonalities have the potential to reveal the ways in which oppression and the current power structure shapes and limits women’s lives. As these underlying influences are illuminated and alternatives emerge, action and transformative social change can be reflected upon and spurred (Smith, 1997). This experience of liberation may be a process of revisiting oppressive forces (Prilleltensky & Nelson, 2002). Freire (2003) referred to this as “conscientização” (p. 74): a moment of disintegration and reintegration in which the elements of oppression are understood and people see themselves and their relationships in a new light. This experience of conscientização enables participants to more clearly understand the ways in which their personal worlds have been shaped by political systems. 2.3.2.1. Fat talk and positive body talk. There is ample evidence that female friendship groups are created around fat talk (Gapinski, Brownell, & LaFrance, 2003; Nichter & Vuckovic, 1994; Tompkins, Martz, Rocheleau, & Bazzini, 2009; Tucker, Martz, Curtin, & Bazzini, 2007). Fat talk, or diet talk, involves women in female social circles socializing, complaining about their bodies, and trading weight management tips (Nichter & Vuckovic, 1994). This is an informal dialogue in which individuals express body dissatisfaction in a group forum. Studies have found that college students perceive fat talk and disparagement about the body to be a normative and appropriate way for women to interact (Britton, Martz, Bazzini, Curtin, & Shomb, 2006; Gapinski et al., 2003). There is social pressure to engage in fat talk; women routinely hear it, and it creates a
74 vicious cycle in which ordinary social interaction reinforces the women’s body dissatisfaction (Tucker et al., 2007). Research on American college students found that simply hearing others engage in fat talk was causally related to increased body dissatisfaction and guilt. Participants who responded with their own fat talk were particularly impacted. Thus fat talk reinforces body dissatisfaction in the speaker and in the listener. However, challenging fat talk through explicit critique mitigated these impacts (Salk & Engeln-Maddox, 2012). One of the benefits of using a focus group in the current study was to create a space where a new norm of positive body talk could be enacted (Tompkins et al., 2009). The goal was to connect women through a sense of joy in their bodies; though some focus groups may be challenged around starting a dialogue about positive body experiences, this was not the case during the present study. Women rarely have the opportunity to engage in positive body talk with cohorts, given the normative expectation of negative body talk. By discussing joyful body experiences in a socially critical group environment, women were able to reinforce the positive body talk they engaged in, and were able to consider other potential routes to experiencing joy in their bodies. It is hoped that the focus-group discussion promoted this process, offering participants the chance to discover more about themselves and their environment, as well as the opportunity to engage in dialogue and exploration. In this way, focus groups can be empowering and transformative for participants, enabling participants to learn from a place of passion (Eldon & Levin, 1991). 2.3.3. The Benefits of Using Multiple Methods. The use of both individual interviews and a focus group as sources of data is a form of qualitative data triangulation which can serve to enhance data richness, deepen inquiry, and provide a more comprehensive understanding of the phenomena under study (Lambert & Loiselle, 2008). Lambert and Loiselle (2008) found that the use of focus groups and individual
75 interviews resulted in a convergence of findings across both methods, which added to the trustworthiness of the data. Additionally, differing results may occur, reflecting differing aspects of the phenomena under study (Moran-Ellis et al., 2006). However, the combination of both techniques may also be used for different purposes, to give a sense of completeness to the research, with each technique exploring different aspects of the phenomena (Lambert & Loiselle, 2008). Lambert and Loiselle noted that similar, dissimilar, and complementary data must be taken into account during data analysis, and that the primary benefit of using both individual interviews and focus groups is the enhanced description of the essential characteristics of the phenomena under study, with regards to both breadth and depth. Ultimately, the purpose of using multiple research methods is to find the best approach to answer the research questions in the most robust manner possible (Freshwater, 2006). Denzin and Lincoln (2008) posited that multiple methods of triangulation was a research strategy that “adds rigor, breadth, complexity, richness and depth” (p. 5). Using multiple methods is a way of preventing research from becoming bound by the biases of a single methodology, and is often understood to refer to using both qualitative and quantitative methods (Freshwater, 2006). However, mixing methods is not as simple as employing quantitative and qualitative measures in the same study. This is because those approaches are based in competing ideologies that are not so easily used together, given that in many studies one method is still given priority over the other (Giddings, 2006; Gilbert, 2006). Giddings (2006) stated that such a mixed-methods approach often reflected slightly moderated positivism, and many researchers have used mixed methods without understanding the different methodologies or ideologies behind them. Using multiple qualitative methods avoids some of these issues while still reflecting the strengths of a multiple methods approach. Specifically addressing the methods selected for this
76 study, individual interviews and focus group discussion both fit with the principles of feminist research and neither is based in ideologies in opposition to the other. Both are focused on creating research space in which women’s experiences can be safely shared and validated. In terms of the current study, both of the methods selected served a specific and important purpose in the overall goals of the study. The individual interviews were designed to tap into women’s subjective experiences, while accessing women’s experiences of joy in their bodies, the meanings they attached to their body experiences, and the ways in which dominant discourses on the body were resisted in these women’s everyday lives. In order to access these elements of their experience, women needed to be able to tell their stories in a setting that was focused on themselves, in a research space that was encouraging, safe, validating, and able to accommodate individual experiences rather than generalized ones (Oakley, 1981). The purpose of the focus group was to unite women’s narratives into a collective experience. Rather than generalizing experiences, the focus group allowed for the collective exploration of themes that united individual stories. It provided a space for women to engage in positive talk about their bodies in ways that were not culturally acceptable, and that participants may not have experienced prior to the focus group. The focus group served to enable women to gain a greater understanding of their collective experiences so that they could see the larger cultural forces at work in their lives (Freire, 2003). Whereas the individual interviews aimed to capture women’s lived experiences, the focus group aimed to elicit women’s critical analysis of the cultural context within which they all operated, while also providing a forum for body pride, and serving the feminist research goal of facilitating social change. While such a focus is possible within the context of the individual interview, it is often the experience of being in a group, of sharing experiences and questioning the emerging commonalities, that leads women into this level of analysis (Eldon & Levin, 1991).
77 2.4. Participants The present study specified a number of inclusion criteria (see Appendix C for study advertisements and Appendices D and E for consent forms): 1. Self-identification as having positive body experiences and resisting negative body talk. This was expressed in the recruitment information (see Appendix C) as follows: “Do you experience a sense of joy, pleasure, and well-being in your body, no matter how you look? Do you resist the expectation that women constantly be 'working on’ or ‘improving’ their bodies, and instead focus on your positive, joyful body experiences?... Participants who identify a focus on feeling good in your body, not as others may see and assess it, but as you feel in your body, experience it, see, accept, enjoy, and celebrate it…. women who are generally satisfied with their appearance, regardless of whether or not they fit the cultural ideal. Participants should be able to easily identify times of feeling joy, pleasure and well-being in their body. We are not looking for women who find it hard to connect with positive body experiences, or only connect with them when they lose weight or come close to meeting an ideal. The study does not include women who are in treatment for eating related problems.” 2. Ages between 20 and 39. 3. Diversity across dimensions, including but not limited to, ethnicity, education level, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status. The first criteria relates to the aim of the study, which is to explore experiences of joy with women who identify as having positive body experiences while resisting negative body talk. The second criterion, age range, was selected because body image issues are most salient for women under the age of 40 (Tiggemann & Lynch, 2001). Therefore, this age range was likely to include women whose resistance to cultural dictates is particularly salient and related to the first
78 criterion of participation. The third criterion of being from a diverse background related to the importance of inclusivity in research, much of which is still completed with young, straight, White college students (Lorde, 1990; McKinley, 2002). In the present study, for recruitment purposes, having a positive body experience was conceptualized along a continuum that accommodated women who felt entirely satisfied with their bodies to women who were generally satisfied, with occasional fleeting moments of dissatisfaction (moments that are understood as normative in the context of the culture, but will not be deeply elaborated on in this study). However, because this study sought to understand the impact of body experiences on women’s everyday lives, only women who did not have current, frequent experiences of body dissatisfaction and who have not been diagnosed or treated for disordered eating patterns were included. The study did not include women who found it hard to connect with positive body experiences, or who connected with those experiences only when their bodies met the cultural ideal. Rather, inclusion as a participant required resistance to the cultural pressures of appearance, accompanied by experiences of joy, pleasure, and well-being in the body that was not contingent on body size, weight, or appearance. The size of the group of participants was based on the guidelines of qualitative interviewing as outlined by Seidman (1991), by using an interview structure that allowed participants to reconstruct their experience, while meeting Seidman’s (1991) criteria for saturation of information. These guidelines indicate that interviewing was terminated once the same information and themes were found to be recurring. Seidman also noted that practical realities of resources, including time and money, play a factor in determining the end point of graduate student research. A total of forty-four potential participants contacted the researcher to express interest in participating in the study. Of these, twenty-four potential participants completed the telephone-
79 screening interview. Among women who were deemed ineligible, the reasons for not meeting research criteria were varied and included: age, previous diagnosis of eating disorder, lack of sufficient English language skills to complete the interview, a pre-existing relationship with the interviewer, the location of the woman as too far away from the researcher to arrange a face-toface interview, travel plans of the potential participant resulting in a lack of availability, lack of compensation, and demographic targets already being filled. A total of sixteen women booked appointments, with three cancelling and opting not to re-schedule (one felt she was not appropriate for the study, one had an ill pet, one had unexpected travel plans arise), and thirteen women completing the interviews. I attempted to recruit a group that was diverse across many dimensions, including but not limited to: ethnicity, education level, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. The recruitment poster specifically indicated that women of diverse backgrounds were being sought (Appendix C). However, while participants from varied social locations were sought (including more than one African-Canadian woman or more than one woman with children), due to constraints of recruitment, it was not possible to achieve this goal. In this study, 13 adult women between the ages of 20 and 38 participated. Of the women who completed individual interviews, nine participants were in ongoing, serious romantic relationships at the time of the study, with an additional woman in a casual ongoing relationship. One participant identified herself as divorced and widowed. Seven of the women lived with their romantic partners, four of the women lived with their parents, and two women lived alone or with roommates. At the time of the study, one woman had children and another was pregnant. The majority of participants resided in large or small urban centres at the time of the interviews, though eight participants had lived in rural locations at some point during their lives. Research participants represented a variety of ethnocultural backgrounds, including two Filipino women,
80 three White women, and one woman from each of the following groups: Caribbean, African, Chinese, Sri Lankan, South Asian, Jewish, Indigenous, and Eastern European. Ten of the participants were born in Canada, and four had immigration experiences (two of those had had multiple immigration experiences), with an additional three participants having parents who immigrated to Canada prior to the participants’ birth. Participants’ household incomes ranged from under $20,000 per year to over $60,000 per year. With regards to participants’ highest level of education, at the time of the interviews, six participants had completed graduate degrees, three had completed undergraduate degrees, three were attending university courses, and one had completed high school. Participants’ religious affiliation included one woman who identified as Jewish, two as Christian, two as Muslim, one as Buddhist, and one as connected to Eastern philosophies. 2.4.1. Narrative Description of the Social Location of Each Individual Participant. Participants approved detailed and specific descriptions of their own social locations. However, in order to protect participants’ identities, I decided to be far less identifying in these descriptions, reducing the specificity of some descriptors and omitting a variety of potentially identifying descriptors including the age of each participant. It is noteworthy that all descriptions of participants are drawn directly from their own self-descriptions, hence inconsistencies in terminology—for example, the use of the terms straight or heterosexual depended on the participants’ own self-identification. Ann identified her ethnocultural heritage as Brown and Caribbean of South Asian Ancestry. Ann was born in Canada, moved to a Caribbean nation late in childhood, and as a youth she returned to Canada with her family. Ann identified her socioeconomic status growing up as poor, and as an adult she identified as middle class. She identified her sexual orientation as
81 straight, was in a relationship with a man at the time of the interview, and did not have children. Ann described her body type as petite, curvy, shapely, fit, and short. Gemma identified her ethnocultural heritage as Asian, from a specific small country. She was born in Asia, immigrated to Canada with her family as a young child, and was raised in a Canadian urban centre. She identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual, and has been married to a man and divorced. She subsequently married again and was widowed; at the time of the interview she was single with no children. She was raised in a traditional and religious household. Gemma identified as having been working class as a child and middle class as an adult. Gemma described her body type as heavy, within a healthy range. Jade identified her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous—she was raised by her single mother, who is non-Native. Jade identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual and at the time of the interview was in a relationship with a man. She did not have children. She was born and raised in a Canadian urban centre. She identified her socioeconomic status as working class in childhood, and described herself as currently having access to financial privilege. Jade described her body type as short, chubby and awesome. Judy described her ethnocultural heritage as Asian. She was raised in a Canadian urban centre. She identifies as Christian. She described her sexual orientation as heterosexual, and has had a partnering relationship with a man in the past, though at the time of the interview she was single, with no children. Her parents immigrated to Canada prior to her birth. Judy identified as having been working class as a child. Judy described her body type as slim, athletic, lean, thin, and petite. Kalli identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian-Asian, from a specific country. She was raised in a Canadian urban centre. She identified her sexual orientation as straight, and has had partnering relationships with men in the past, although at the time of the interview she
82 was single with no children. Her parents immigrated to Canada prior to her birth. Kalli identified her socioeconomic status as having been middle class as a child and working class as an adult. She described her body type as muscular. Krishna described her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian Canadian, and identified strongly with the country and culture that she was born into. She immigrated to Canada as a child with her family. Krishna identified her socioeconomic status as having been middle class as both a child and an adult, with a household income of $20,000 to $40,000. She was raised in a Canadian urban centre. She identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual. At the time of the interview she lived at home with her family, and has always been single with no children. Krishna described her body type as hourglass, healthy, and “perfect for me.” Nimco was born in East Africa. As a child she immigrated to Canada with her family. As a child she identified her socioeconomic status as working class, and as an adult she identified as middle class. She reported her religion as Muslim. She identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual and at the time of the interview was married to a man. She has children. Nimco described her body type as being a medium build, small on top and curvy around the hips. Ophelia identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian. She was raised in an urban centre. She identified her sexual orientation as queer; at the time of the interview she was in an open relationship with a woman, and has been in relationships with men in the past. She did not have children. She identified her socioeconomic status as a child as working class and as an adult identified as working class, with a household income under $20,000. Ophelia described her body type as fat, pear-shaped, and big breasted. Ostara identified her ethnocultural heritage as being Canadian. She has a genetic health condition that led to some alteration of appearance and perceptual difficulties. She described her sexual orientation as open and fluid, but primarily heterosexual, and at the time of the interview
83 was in a relationship with a male partner. She did not have children. She described her socioeconomic status as having been poor as a child and middle class as an adult, with her household income as $20,000 to $40,000. She described her body type as luscious, full, and muscular. Pamelia identified her ethnocultural heritage as White. She was born in Canada and raised in a rural location. She identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual. At the time of the interview she was in a monogamous relationship with a male, with no children. Growing up, she identified her socioeconomic status as economically comfortable, and as an adult she identified as middle class. Pamelia described her body type as slim/athletic, short/average height. Radha described her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian, as well as Eastern philosophy and a high level of awesomeness. Her parents immigrated to Canada prior to her birth. Radha identified her sexual orientation as hetero and slightly bi, and at the time of the interview was in a long-term relationship with a man. She has no children. Radha identified her socioeconomic status as middle class both growing up and as an adult, with a current household income above $60,000. She had been diagnosed with a chronic illness. She described her body type as healthy, average, curvy, South Asian, beyond description. Tali identified her ethnocultural heritage as White and Jewish. She was raised in Canada and moved several times in both rural and urban areas. Tali identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual, and her partnering status as in a monogamous marriage with a man. She had no children. Tali identified her socioeconomic status growing up as upper middle class, and as an adult she identified as middle class, with a household income above $40,000. She described her body type as fat, “in-betweenie,” plus-sized, and chubby. Zena described her ethnocultural heritage by birth as Canadian of Eastern European descent. She identified her sexual orientation as homosexual, and her partnering status as married
84 to a female partner. At the time of the interview she did not have children. Zena identified having been diagnosed with multiple chronic health conditions. She reported having been adopted. Zena identified her socioeconomic status as having been middle class as a child and working class as an adult. Zena described her body type as powerful, large, sexy, fertile, strong, and temperamental. 2.5. Procedure 2.5.1. Recruitment and Orientation. Participants were recruited through posting a recruitment letter in businesses, neighbourhoods, and community centres throughout Toronto. These notices outlined the purposes of the study, the selection criteria for participation and contact information for the investigator (see Appendix C). This notice was also disseminated via electronic mail, and was posted on online social networking sites, including Craig’s List, Couch Surfing, and Kijiji; these are public sites, which do not require permission to access. Additionally, a recruitment email was sent to The Department of Caribbean and African Studies at the University of Toronto, to Caribana organizers and Caribana Mas bands, as well as to many of the researcher’s contacts. These groups were asked to forward the recruitment letter on to their contacts. Recruitment advertisements were placed in coffee shops in four areas of Toronto, as well as at a prominent women’s bookstore, in belly dancing classes, at a health centre for low-income women of colour, at Planned Parenthood, at an employment centre for people of colour, in a community centre for women of colour, in three local libraries in areas of town that cater to communities of colour as well as low-income communities, in a community centre in a predominantly gay area, and in a community centre for individuals of Jamaican descent. Additionally, an advertisement was placed on an online board at the University of Toronto. As a secondary recruitment method, the participants who took part in the interviews were given several copies of the recruitment letter to
85 pass along to contacts they believed might be interested in the study. Candidates for participation were asked to contact the principal investigator if they were interested in participating in the study or wanted more information. Participants were given the option of contacting the interviewer by email, and an email exchange took place with further information being provided. If the participant chose to use email, a time was set whereby an initial screening interview occurred by telephone. During the initial phone contact, the investigator described the study. The investigator ensured that participants met the selection criteria for inclusion in the study by confirming that the potential participant had read the recruitment letter outlining inclusion criteria (see Appendix C) and clarifying the potential participant’s eligibility. During this initial contact, potential participants were required to give only their first name or to use a pseudonym. Individuals who did not meet inclusion criteria were thanked for their interest. A time and place for the first interview was set for interested and appropriate candidates. Participants were informed that the interviews would be audio recorded Taking part in the study included participating in one interview, and participants were informed of the possibility of a second clarifying interview. For those interested, there was the option of participating in a focus group discussion. At every stage in the study, participants had the option not to continue with subsequent stages or to engage in only those parts of the activities with which they felt comfortable. Participants were informed of the various aspects of the project during these initial contacts and it was explained that, upon completion of each stage of the project, they were free to decide not to continue in the process. 2.5.2. The Interview. At the interview, participants received a consent form (Appendix D) outlining the purpose of the research, what would be involved in participation, issues of confidentiality, the
86 voluntary nature of participation, and the uses of study data. Participants were informed that the interview would be audio taped and transcribed, and that only identifying codes or pseudonyms would be used on cassettes, transcripts, files, and reports. Participants were assured of anonymity and confidentiality, and were assured that they would have the opportunity to delete or change any aspect of the transcript that resulted from their interview. Participants were informed that they may withdraw from the study at any time, and may withdraw their data prior to the writing of the research report without negative consequences. Participants were given a copy of the consent form, which was discussed prior to signing, and which they were required to sign as a condition of participation. Participants were also provided with a list of available therapy services. The interviewer built rapport with participants by engaging in conversation with participants outside of the interview, inviting feedback and questions, and attending to the participants’ comfort in the room by offering seating choice and control of light levels and temperature. Additionally, participants were invited to request a break when needed, and informed that they could decline to answer any question at any point. This rapport building is reflective of feminist research, whereby rapport building involves the researcher identifying her power position (Oakley, 2005). At the beginning of the interview, participants were thanked for agreeing to be interviewed, reminded that they could decline to answer any question for any reason, and reminded that they could change or remove any element of the transcript, and that all identifying information would be removed. At the start of the first interview, the purpose of the study was reviewed, and informed consent was obtained. The basic interview protocol (see Appendix A) was followed. The interviews lasted approximately ninety minutes, to a maximum of two hours and forty-five minutes. Throughout the interview, probes were used in order to obtain more
87 information and to follow the participant in what she wanted to speak about. There was room for participants to tell their stories, ask questions, and give opinions; the intent was to give the participants space to voice their experiences. As the interview continued, the interviewer asked questions not covered in the initial discussion, using probes for clarification or expansion where necessary. Participants were often deeply engaged in the research interviews and several participants commented on how much they were enjoying the conversation and requested time to informally chat with the researcher once the interview was finished. At the end of each interview, each participant was asked if there were any other relevant issues that they wanted to address. Participants were thanked for their participation, asked to fill out a demographic questionnaire (see Appendix B), and asked how they preferred the transcript be sent to them. I inquired as to whether I may contact them further if any aspect of the interview required further clarification, once it had been transcribed. Participants were given copies of the recruitment letter to pass along to anyone they thought would be interested and were also asked to choose a pseudonym that was attached to all of the study material. Participants interested in receiving the results of the study were also asked to complete a request for information form (Appendix F); all participants requested results of the study. Participants were asked if they were interested in taking part in the focus group discussion. If they were interested, the researcher informed them that they would be contacted at a later time with the details of the group, at which point they could decide whether or not they would participate. Each of the thirteen individual interview participants expressed an interest in the focus group, contingent on their availability. Several weeks to months after the interview, participants were sent a copy of their interview transcript, their demographic outline, and a brief summary of their interview transcript to allow them to comment on its comprehensiveness and accuracy. This was sent through their preferred method of contact, which for all participants was electronic mail. The goal of
88 summarizing the interview transcripts was to check the researcher’s initial understanding with participants, and also to provide participants with a shorter version of the transcript that would take them less time to read. Preparing the summaries also increased the researcher’s familiarity with the transcript material. If any questions arose or clarifications were required with regards to the interview content, the participants were invited to speak with the researcher again and were given the option of another interview, a phone conversation, or email. All participants verified their approval of their demographic outline, transcript summary, and transcript. The consent form (see Appendix D) indicated that participants might potentially be contacted regarding a second interview, if needed, for clarification purposes. However, given that the first interviews were long and comprehensive, with the participants sharing many experiences, one interview was deemed to be sufficient and no second interviews were conducted. Steps were taken to protect participants’ confidentiality. Participants created pseudonyms for themselves that were used in all written reports; tapes, transcripts and questionnaires were labelled only with these pseudonyms for identification purposes. All identifying material was removed from the transcripts. As well, participants were able to delete or change any information from the summary and transcript that they felt might identify them. One participant requested that sensitive material be removed from the transcript, and all such material was excised. 2.5.3. The Focus Group. At the completion of the individual interview, participants were invited to participate in the focus group, if interested. The focus group was an optional element of the study and required three or more participants to take part in order for it to proceed. Once all of the individual interviews were conducted, a date was set for the focus group. Additional focus groups would have been scheduled if the number of women participating exceeded eight, in order to ensure everyone’s voice was included in the discussion. According to Kitzinger (1995), the ideal focus
89 group involves four to eight participants, is in a relaxed comfortable setting with refreshments, and lasts one to two hours, though it may be longer. However, though all participants expressed an interest in participating in the focus group, scheduling a time that worked for all participants proved to be challenging. Ultimately, a date was chosen that accommodated the availability of the largest number of participants. Five participants agreed to participate on the given day, and three attended and participated in the focus group. The goal was for participants to talk to each other while the researcher clarified the topics. Due to the small size of the group and the expressly feminist nature of the research, when participants requested that I answer focus group questions as well, I obliged, as suggested by Oakley (2005). The focus group questions (see Appendix G) were more open-ended than the individual interview questions, in order to provide participants more freedom to explore issues as they wished. Overall, participants were asked to reflect on their positive body experiences and their experience of the process of exploration through the individual interviews and the focus group discussion. The moderator drew connections between the women’s experiences and encouraged the group to consider how their experiences fit into the larger social context. However, participants also effectively achieved these goals themselves through a process of co-creating the content of the focus group. The focus group discussion lasted for three hours, not including a meal break, during which food was provided by the researcher, and all participants and the researcher interacted. One primary purpose of the focus group was to provide women with social space in which to engage in positive body talk with other women. Given the prevalence of negative body talk and the expectation of body dissatisfaction that women in this culture are subjected to, this aspect of the study was intended to help create social action in the form of enabling participants to share their experiences with other women in a supportive space, in addition to being a research event. Focus group participants seemed interested in continuing the
90 discussion long past the end time of the group. However, due to the lengthy meeting time, the researcher ended the group. 2.5.4. Remuneration. There was no financial remuneration for this study. 2.6. Data Analysis Data analysis was an ongoing process, beginning with memos, notes, and research journal entries following each interview. This ongoing process of writing and reflecting on each interview informed subsequent interviews, whereby questions at times became more specific and at other times became broader and more open-ended. The data analysis process began with immersion in the transcripts by listening to audio tapes while reading and typing the transcripts; transcripts that were transcribed by a transcriptionist were reviewed with audio verification of the content. In order to increase familiarity with each participant’s experiences and to provide a background context for the analysis, each transcript was summarized and read through several times before coding began. Initial coding required close proximity to the data while following Charmaz’s (2010) constructivist approach to grounded data analysis. The goal of the data analysis was to engage in theme extraction with the interview material and for the themes to gradually emerge through careful grounding in the words of the participants. Data was analyzed from the ground up to move beyond participants’ answers by focusing on their words and experiences. The first level of coding involved coding units based on their content; at this stage, each text unit was given one or more descriptive codes based solely on its contents. Codes underwent numerous re-arrangements, with hundreds of preliminarily codes per interview, which were distilled into 20-30 themes. During second level coding, these codes were organized based on an interpretation and analysis of the text unit’s relationship to broader categories that emerged from
91 other passages in the transcript, and from the transcripts of other participants. Pattern coding is this second level beyond naming. It is more explanatory, identifies patterns and pulls material together into more meaningful units of analysis, “grouping those summaries into a smaller number of sets, themes, or constructs” (Miles & Huberman, 1994, p. 69). This involved the establishment of a set of categories that “arise from and make sense of our specific data” (Ely, 1991, p. 145). This stage also involved looking for connections and identifying these patterns as a system of conceptual order. For the purposes of analysis, this organizing system was derived from the data itself through an inductive process of bringing together all material that topically fit together (Tesch, 1990). The main tool in this data analysis was comparing and contrasting to create categories and to assign data segments to these categories, with a goal of discovering patterns (Tesch, 1990). Throughout, the process involves constant comparison of text units both within and across transcripts (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). The analysis of data through theme extraction involved transcriptions of the interview gradually developing into themes that were common to participants. This followed Seidman’s (1991) guidelines to: organize excerpts from the transcripts into categories. The researcher then searches for connecting threads and patterns among the excerpts within those categories and for connections between the various categories that might be called themes. In addition to presenting profiles of individuals, the researcher, as part of his or her analysis of the material, can then present and comment upon excerpts from the interviews thematically organized. (p. 107) The data was then conceptually ordered as per Miles and Huberman’s (1994) thematic conceptual matrix, in which “general conceptual themes can be the ordering principle” (p. 131). A single coding system was used for all transcripts in order to facilitate the identification of similarities and differences. This coding system was hierarchical, with higher order categories, and lower order categories grouped under them. Initially, QSR N6 software (QSR International, 2002) was used to code this material, however, ultimately this software became unwieldy, and
92 sub themes were written on index cards. Themes were sorted and overarching themes were built from there. A theme is defined as a “statement of meaning that (1) runs through all or most of the pertinent data, or (2) one in the minority” (Ely, 1991. p. 150). Themes are established through analysis and they provide meaning and cohesion as well as anchoring the findings (Ely, 1991). The final analysis involved a reorganization of the themes into core dimensions. The process of data analysis enabled the researcher to add codes when necessary, which occurred throughout the data analysis period. The coding system was reassessed and modified in ways similar to those described by Lincoln and Guba (1985). The coding system was adapted to accommodate both the wealth of data and the researcher’s changing understanding of the data, which involved codes being added throughout the coding process as new themes emerged. Similarly, old codes were also discarded, as they were no longer the best fit for the data as new relationships were discovered. This allowed the researcher to restructure the codes into broader themes, and into core dimensions. The final coding system represents the themes and core dimensions that emerged from across interviews, and primarily signified participants’ common understandings and experiences, with acknowledgement of divergences in participants’ understandings and experiences. 2.6.1. Researcher’s Reflexivity. I believe that acknowledgement of subjectivity is inherent in and essential to feminist research approaches. My interest in women’s joyful body experiences emerged through my clinical work with trauma. I noted the importance of a strengths-based approach in working with trauma clients, and I also realized that personally I needed to engage in research space that was based in positive psychology. My pre-existing knowledge of this topic was primarily through my own body-based experiences of joy. My reading on women’s experiences revealed a host of both
93 theoretical and research material on women’s body dissatisfaction. However, I did not see my experiences reflected or represented in that research, nor did I see the experiences of many of my friends, whereby joy in our bodies was not contingent or conditional on a particular body size, or shape, or appearance, and indeed, we engaged in a complete rejection of the dieting culture. I noted the contrast between this experience and that of other friends who were highly appearance focused. In order to assist me in choosing the research topic, I kept a research journal outlining the interests I wanted to learn and know more about, and an Adrienne Rich (1986) quote particularly spoke to me: “Perhaps we need a moratorium on saying ‘the body’… When I write ‘the body,’ I see nothing in particular. To write ‘my body’ plunges me into lived experience, particularity” (p. 215). This led to a review of material on the body, and I connected it to my lived experience in my own body. Additionally, it led to a reading of work on researcher objectivity and subjectivity, and a deeper consideration of what I believe to be the subjectivity in all research, though the researcher’s situated position is often denied. I brainstormed and read material that was compelling; Shroff’s (1993) article “¡Deliciosa! The body, passion, and pleasure” was particularly inspiring. I considered ways in which to incorporate a feminist social action piece into the study as well. My own experiences contributed to my interest, however, the direction taken by participants in their responses was theirs alone and was the basis of this research. During interviews, some of the content ideas were mine (such as querying experiences with sex and food). I quickly discovered, however, that participants were highly responsive to open-ended content questions, and that they experienced a variety of unexpected activities as joyful (such as crafting and yoga). I attended to theses differences throughout the process, remaining aware of participants’ experiences that seemed similar to mine. I consciously sought to understand those
94 experiences from the participant’s perspective, so as to clearly remain aware of the similarities and differences from my own experience and to avoid making assumptions regarding their experiences. I also reflected at length on the experiences of participants whose embodied joy was far different from my own, seeking to understand it and the places of similarity and difference, which often involved open and curious inquiries during the course of the interview. Indeed, my awareness of my situated position resulted in me querying more during all of the interviews to ensure I was not making assumptions regarding the meaning of any participants’ experiences. I was worried about critiquing participants, and sometimes felt that I was struggling to find words to clarify my questions. I dialogued and journalled on these issues in order to remain cognizant of them, and included my understandings with summaries that I sent to participants in order to verify that I was accurately comprehending, interpreting, and representing their experiences. Somewhat ironically, the analysis process, which felt more intellectual to me as compared to the embodied and interactive interviews, enabled a greater sense of distance from my experience, whereby at times I felt as though I was a mind processing the interview material, and had left both my pre-existing understandings and my own embodiment behind—though of course I had not. Though I was completing the analysis from my situated position, at times I did feel as if the learning process was uni-directional, with a great wealth of knowledge from research interviews flowing towards me. I have always been highly open to joyful experiences, however, this work has brought a new level of awareness to my own joyful embodied experiences, and to the importance of joy in my life and in my resistance activities. During both the interviews and the process of analysis, there were many moments of surprise and complexity as unexpected phenomena emerged. I was surprised to learn new things about participants each time I reviewed the transcripts, and to constantly gain a more nuanced
95 understanding of their perspectives. My research journal notes outlined the ways in which each woman had her own set of themes. Often these themes were clear during the interview, though at times the interviews were not entirely clear and required additional clarifications in the moment, followed by ongoing reflection. Several women returned to resistance repeatedly, while others focused particularly on their joyful experience. Some of the participants asked to meet again, in a non-interview setting, to discuss the results of the research. Women were highly physically expressive when discussing joy, often engaging their hands, and sometimes using props, such as a scarf. The interviews were filled with laughter, and I generally found them to be an immersive and joyful experience. Several women shared with me that they had a similar experience with respect to the interviews. Interestingly, women did not seem to derive joy from the performative aspects of femininity (such as waxing body hair, or doing their nails), however, they often became visibly excited when discussing food or discussing their favourite joyful body activities. The women were very enthusiastic, but the lack of compensation was a barrier to participation. It is noteworthy that given my own pre-existing views, which remained open to understanding the participants’ lived experiences, another researcher coming from a different place may have found very different results regarding the phenomena. However, my hope is that this analysis resonates with anyone who has experienced joyful embodiment themselves, and perhaps could serve as a guidepost for those who have not.
Chapter Three - Experiences of Joy in the Body Women in this study were asked to reflect upon joyful experiences in their bodies, with a focus on embodiment and feeling particularly good in their bodies. Their understandings of joy in their bodies emerged through discussion of the particular activities that they defined as joyful and their experiences with those activities. Joyful body activities were varied and included (but were not limited to): physical activities, such as dancing, swimming and bicycling; writing activities, including journaling; artistic activities, such as painting; sensual activities, such as sex; food creation and consumption; relaxation activities, including bathing and massage; and playful activities. (For a comprehensive list of specific activities that women experienced as joyful, see Appendix H). Through women’s detailed descriptions of particular experiences of joy in their bodies, a number of themes emerged that were common to women’s embodied experiences of joy. These themes are captured in the themes in Chapter 3, Experiences of Joy in the Body, namely Attunement, Growth, Liberation, and Thriving (see Figure 1 for a delineation of the themes in Experiences of Joy). These themes, as well as sub-themes, will be discussed in detail in this chapter. Figure 1. Themes within the core dimension of Experiences of Joy in the Body.
Experiences of Joy in the Body
Attunement
Growth
Liberation
96
Thriving
97 3.1. Attunement Attunement reflected women’s deepened awareness and understanding of their own needs during joyful activities. The theme of Attunement included the sub-themes of Mind-Body Harmony and Trusting Oneself in the Moment (see Figure 2 for the delineation of sub-themes within the theme of Attunement). Figure 2. Sub-themes within the theme of Attunement.
Attunement
Mind-Body Harmony
Trusting Oneself in the Moment
3.1.1. Mind-Body Harmony. Mind-Body Harmony is a sub-theme of Attunement that reflects a space whereby women felt a deep connection between their physical and emotional worlds, and a sense of wholeness. Many of the women experienced a profound mind-body connection when engaged in joyful experiences, whereby their mind and body were mutually reinforced and both were engaged. It’s really, really good. You feel light, too, when you’re running you feel light, you feel buoyant, you feel really, really happy ’cause running, it’s really a culmination of your body and your mind. It has to work together; you can’t just put your mind somewhere else and run ’cause then eventually you stop. So it’s really in tune and then where you’re aware of that in-tuneness, then you feel really good. [Krishna] Most women had a deep sense of continuity during joyful body experiences, creating a sense of harmony between the state of mind they were experiencing and their body. Kalli identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian-Asian.
98 I can’t ever separate my mind and body connection—it’s either stronger or weaker. But when my mind is happy it usually makes my body happy and vice versa, so the reason why I love yoga so much is because I’m able to just relax and let things go. And I think if my mind was very tense about things it would manifest in my body as well, so it kind of goes both ways. It’s a Buddhist sort of philosophy. It’s not about “I have to do this.” So it’s very not time based, “drive, drive, drive, push, push, push. I need to do this and get frustrated when I don’t do it.” These thoughts don’t occur in my mind. I’m trying to just be open to the experience, okay, let’s see what I can do and just enjoy the experience, and so that’s where the full body enjoyment, because I think if I was so fixated on the goal and got frustrated, I don’t think my body would be enjoying it as much, because it would be stressed. [Kalli] Several participants noted that when they engaged in joyful body experiences, they experienced a change in mindset. For Gemma, this occurred when she travelled. Anticipating travel also provided her with a shift in her mindset during her daily life. I could be at home anywhere. I like changing my environment because it changes my mind. It’s a mental shift. It’s a necessary mental shift and I think frequent travel is for me. I can work very, very hard here because I know, for example, I’m going to [a city on the East coast]… I’ve got a break at the end of the month and I’m going to go on a road trip. [Gemma] This was in contrast to Zena who is a Canadian of Eastern European descent and of a working class background, whereby her mind needed to be calm prior to engaging in joyful body experiences: “So it’s a mental choice to stay in my joy and, if I can’t do that mentally, then I can’t do it physically. It has to happen in my head first.”
Other participants described the ways in which wholeness in their body connected their entire body, mind and mood. They particularly relayed a sense of wholeness when engaged in
99 highly focused physical activities, such as dancing or sexual activity. Ophelia experienced a sense of her energy and emotion as synergistically connected. Dancing with myself. I love putting on Rage Against the Machine or something really loud and crazy and just dancing by myself because sometimes you just have so much energy and you need to get it out or so much emotion that you can channel through dancing. Yeah, it’s a powerful thing. [Ophelia] Several participants noted that their sense of wholeness in body and mind is related to their own health problems. They noted an awareness of the disease and an awareness of the impact of one bodily issue on their whole body, coupled with an appreciation of health in their bodies. Radha described her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian, and identified with Eastern philosophy. I have [chronic illness] disease, and so being aware of having some digestive problems I do have a bit of a greater sense about feeling well and unwell. And growing up and learning to focus on being calm and breathing for spiritual reasons also kind of teaches you to be aware of your body just in general. So just being aware of when you do feel good is a joyous experience. Having felt really bad on medications or just having had symptoms of the disease, so just being aware of the joy of health is another thing that I don’t take for granted. [Radha] Similarly, other women reported a sense of agency in being aware of their bodily experiences and of their role in shifting their experiences out of pain and negative dynamics and into joyfulness. This particularly pertained to women with ongoing health problems.
Being very conscious about my experience. I usually have a bit of a nervous stomach so that always makes me reflect and just feel as I go. Okay, today I’m not feeling so great. Or okay what can I eat or not eat to kind of hold that feeling. So I think that’s really affected my sense of awareness and my self-consciousness about that. That is the positive is that in reaction to that I’m more aware of when I do feel particularly happy or tranquil or I have that, those positive sensations. I
100 think it’s just not being so preoccupied with worry, because I felt as though that triggered a lot of my stomach issues. Stress and the gut goes hand in hand. And I think that it was more so in order to to kind of regain that sense of agency, control over how stress affects me. [Judy] Women also spoke about their perspective on minor aches and the place of those aches in the body as a whole. Women described joyful experiences in their bodies as encompassing pleasurable and positive experiences, as well as more challenging experiences. An awareness of your body as a good thing and as a positive thing rather than something that doesn’t measure up to an ideal or that you might feel an ache or something and you’re focusing on the ache, but the body is bigger than just an ache, so experiencing all of that. [Radha] Many participants found that through meditation they attained a sense of perspective on their mind-body connection. I did this meditation retreat a few years ago…. So you are meditating ten hours a day and you don’t talk for ten days… you start by just focusing on the sensation of the breath coming in and out of your nose and then you go to this triangle, sensation of the breath anywhere. The idea is to be equanimous the whole time so you are not saying “this feels good or this feels bad,” this just feels and just being aware… So then you go to your whole body… focusing on how all of the sensations on your body feel and you kind of go to different body parts and sometimes my legs would feel like they were on fire and just really heavy and I would just want to get up right away… you just get really in the practice of like, it’s okay, just sit with it. It’s okay. It’s not going to hurt you. It’s just a sensation.… you can come to the state where you feel all the little tiny movements of everything in your body… your body is this circle around you and you are in the centre, just being aware of the whole thing moving around you. [Ostara]
101 Women discussed this sense of wholeness as a refusal to see their bodies as component pieces and instead they embraced the entirety of themselves. Jade identified her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous. That feeling of being at home, of just being… we tend to body chop a lot, and say this is how I feel here here here and here, but just kind of combining that and taking it as a whole. And a part of it is not looking down and looking at the constituent parts, but your body is mapped onto your brain and feeling from that part, instead of looking at your physical body and then having feelings. [Jade] 3.1.2. Trusting Oneself in the Moment. Trusting Oneself in the Moment was another sub-theme under the theme of Attunement, whereby participants experienced a sense of clarity and being at peace with themselves. This sub-theme included a primary focus on both self-acceptance and immersion and engagement. Self-acceptance involved the experience of knowing what was best for one’s self, and accepting these needs or abilities without judgment. For example, Ophelia did not judge her fluctuating capabilities with bicycling. Let's say it’s May and I’m just starting to do really regular bike riding instead of just sort of sporadic like, oh, I guess I can bear it today… And I'll make it halfway up a hill and I know I have to stop and I'm okay with that. And then I walk the rest of the way up the hill. But come August, any hill I can take it. And I know that about myself… it’s just sort of like this is where I'm at today and that's where I will be at later. And what’s marvellous is knowing yourself and knowing your, not your limits, but just knowing your capabilities and being okay with them. And that’s where I feel joyful is when I can recognize that and just let it be. [Ophelia] Participants spoke about the importance of focusing on their feelings and bodily experiences in a non-judgmental way, trusting themselves and their bodies even with activities
102 that seemed silly; if it felt good, they continued on and trusted that they were doing what was best for them. It just felt really good to wear a T-shirt with socks and nothing else. I just wanted to lay in this curled position and tickle my legs and just rub my feet and kind of hop around the room [laughter]… it felt so good to be playful with myself… I was just painting like that. I always paint really crouched on the floor, really close to the painting…[laughter]. I felt like I wanted to do it all night. It just felt so perfect. [Ostara] Most participants mentioned this sense of trust in their selves and non-judgment of themselves as it related to food consumption. Pamelia identified her childhood socioeconomic status as economically comfortable, and as an adult she identified her socioeconomic status as middle class. Depending on what I eat I feel really differently. This is a little bit connected to rowing again, because since I’ve started training for races, I’ve had to think a lot more about what I eat and just how that affects how I feel. So I found eating things like a lot of vegetables and fruit and just a lot of things with water and drinking a lot more water helps me feel a lot better, and just having to think about eating a balanced diet, eating a lot of different foods. And having thought about that makes me feel a lot better, but also not being too restrictive, like not stopping myself from eating when I’m hungry, and it’s a good feeling not have to think about okay, I can’t eat this or I can’t eat that. I eat when I’m hungry. [Pamelia] Similarly, an element of the joyful experience involved trusting oneself and responding to needs around food consumption non-judgementally. There are times when I have a huge craving and that’s all I can think about all day. Then I come home during classes or work or whatever and completely just whip it up and just sit down and eat. It’s just so really satisfying… It was poutine [laughter]. I had a really huge craving, and, but then I was craving a very specific type so I went out to the grocery store after work and picked up some sweet
103 potatoes and some brie cheese and some ground beef and just whipped it all up. It just felt really good to have that craving fulfilled. [Judy] This experience of joy occurred with a variety of biologically necessary activities, including rest and sleep. I love sleeping. I really love sleeping. And I really have a totally joyful experience when I wake up early on a weekend and realize I can sleep in. And then just kind of like burrow myself in and just feel really nice. I don't have to worry about anything, all my muscles are relaxed, everything is where it’s supposed to be and I can just go back to sleep again. Napping is really nice, too. [Tali] For many women self-acceptance related to being fearless about their engagement with work or other activities. Zena reported multiple chronic health conditions. You give yourself the benefit of the doubt and give yourself a space to work without judgment, then… all the fear about, am I doing this right, am I doing it well enough, am I just making stuff up, all those fears go away. [Zena] Self-acceptance of the body was also an important aspect of accepting and trusting oneself. I don’t even judge myself, but that’s very difficult; it’s taken a long time to actually come to this place, and a lot of people don’t work towards it.… in terms of looking at my own physical body, I’ve just chosen to accept it. Sometimes I wish I didn’t have this perpetual roll, but it’s like you know what, I’ll wear clothing that doesn’t emphasize it as much, but that’s it. The thought doesn’t really enter my mind more than necessary, because I’m more focused on what my body is able to do than how it looks or what it’s not able to do. [Kalli] Several women noted that letting go and being at ease was an element of their joyful experiences. Being at ease particularly pertained to relaxing activities, such as resting and
104 sleeping. Radha identified her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian, as well as claiming Eastern philosophy. In yoga, a corpse pose is just a pose where you just specifically rest for the sake of resting, that’s all it is. And it’s usually about relaxing all parts of your body and being mindful of them so that there is no tension. And it’s usually done at the end of the yoga session to kind of end in a peaceful, calm, quiet manner. And that’s sort of the same about how I fall asleep. I usually fall asleep on my back and I usually try and relax my body so I’m actually specifically thinking of parts of my body. I usually like to read before bed and sometimes I read the news, and so sometimes I have a furrowed brow, so I specifically remember to do that. Sometimes I clench my jaw, so I remember to relax that, to breathe deeply, and then to kind of just let my gut hang out, whatever, let it all hang out. [Radha] Most of the women experienced being at ease as a common thread related to all of their joyful body experiences. My yoga practice, I’ll say advanced poses or whatnot because I do try to progress, but I’m very relaxed. So although it may seem that I’m very active, the whole time I’m breathing really calmly. I even prefer not to sweat if I can and so I’ve a very relaxed calm approach to advancing my yoga and the poses, and that’s the way I approach it. I’m not Type A in any form, which I don’t push, push, push. It’s like everything is all felt and, yeah, at ease. [Kalli] Many participants described joyful experiences as involving a focus on the moment through immersion and engagement while in a state of a natural rhythm or flow. This occurred as women pursued a wide variety of activities including eating, sexual activity, hobbies, dancing, or work. Zena identified her sexual orientation as homosexual; she is married to a woman. One of the things that I do to keep myself in my joy is physical activity: biking, Pilates, yoga, meditation, dance, and mental emotional activities, writing, sewing, cooking, sex. Those are all things that can support my decision to be in my joy because those are the things that I don’t have to be anywhere else when I’m doing
105 them. If I can completely focus on making a beautiful meal or completely focus on having a date with my wife or completely focus on writing, if I can do that, everything else falls away because it is about that activity. [Zena] Several participants described the ways in which they are deeply engaged and immersed in the moment. Engagement typically occurred during activities that involved physicality, such as running, or activities that required creativity, such as painting, as well as activities that required a sustained focus. Engagement and immersion also involved a sense of movement and building a pace that felt natural and flowed. However, the focus was on the emotional space that they created and sustained throughout the activity. If I’m cooking, that I work up to this pace and there’s something in the movement that it feels like you're building a rhythm. You reach for something and it’s there and you throw, and I don’t measure anymore. I just feel it.… that’s what I meant by the movement of it, that it has become not a chore or something. It just, it feels natural. When I make my standard recipes, I just do them almost without thinking and it’s nice. [Ophelia] Similarly, engagement and immersion involved a sense that the actions came naturally or were instinctual. A lot of physical times it’s like that meditative part of it or the part where everything is just engaged in a way that it’s like finally getting a key into a hole. It’s just like this is a perfect something… that’s another way that I could maybe experience it having sex or having an orgasm with my partner… It’s almost instinctual. [Radha] Women identified a self-focus in their joyful experiences, rather than concern about what other people think of them. Women commented on a sense of contentment and absence of worry in allowing the functionality of their bodies to occur.
106 Maybe because of my past at being dissatisfied with my body a while ago and now being satisfied with it, sometimes it’s if I don’t notice my body, if I’m doing an activity or doing something, it’s like the absence of worry. I’m not worried about what I look like, I’m not worried about what people think of what I look like. I’m just feeling the moment. There are also nice, physical feelings.… my body is doing what it’s supposed to do for me. It’s being a vehicle for pleasure and activity and sustenance and all those kinds of things. So if I do check in with it at times, it’s a “hey, great job, things are working well,” this is exactly what it’s supposed to feel like. [Tali] This also involved a sense of confirmation of how their body is functioning. Ann said, “I've always liked dancing… my body’s working properly.” This concludes the results regarding the first theme in joyful body experience, namely, Attunement. This theme included the sub-themes of Mind-Body Harmony, and Trusting Oneself in the Moment. 3.2. Growth The second theme of Joyful Experiences in the Body, Growth, refers to what the women described as a process of growth in learning and building towards goals as they engaged in their joyful activities. This theme related to physical activities with the goal of reaching a milestone or experiencing incremental improvements, as well as other activities involving a sense of skill building, mastery, capability, and building self-esteem. The goals women strove to achieve were personally valued goals, rather than goals imposed from the outside or experienced as oppressive. For example, their goals did not relate to maintaining a certain body weight or achieving a certain body size. The nature of their goals often related to achieving a sense of pride and accomplishment, building confidence by challenging themselves, and being capable. Women described their engagement in a learning process, learning through reading, or learning other new skills such as cooking, with a focus on skill building and progress.
107 My focus is usually learning—learning something, trying to challenge myself a little bit more.… I think learning something is probably my other passion. So whether it be taking a formal course or informally learning through other people, I really enjoy that. [Nimco] Women spoke about finding motivation through learning. I started definitely getting more into sports and I think that’s been a theme in my life. It’s about doing fun things, activities that I find rewarding, activities that I find are skill building that I gain a lot of positive experience not just through my body, it feels good, but also mentally. And I think that’s really key, because then I always want to go back if I’m learning through it. And because of that, I don’t care so much about how I look, it’s more just what I can do.… I know with time, practice leads to progression, so I’m just very patient with it. I try to be very safe—I love learning new things. So whenever I’m trying a new activity where I’m learning something, I try to figure it out and regardless if I’ve physically done something new, usually mentally something new has occurred to me. And so I call them baby steps, because it’s not like I have—as many times as I need to do it towards the goal is fine. Whether or not I actually achieve it is less relevant, as long as I feel like I’m learning something physically and mentally just because, it’s connected. Yeah, so that’s what keeps me motivated. [Kalli] Many of the women noted that they found a range of different types of goals motivated them. Once I’ve completed that mission I can go on to another one… You have a goal, you complete it and you go on to the next one. That’s how I talk all the time now. I’m on a mission and I have all these missions, these goals and once I complete them, and they’re very simple things like, on his birthday I’m going to fly. That’s one mission. On my birthday I’m going to be in a new country—that’s my mission. All the time I have these missions, these little goals, and it builds confidence. [Gemma] Women set goals in their capacity to physically engage in activities.
108 After I’ve accomplished something, so right now I’m training for a 10-mile run and just progressively benchmarking the distance that I’ve run. So when I make my target it just feels good… when I’ve completed a project of mine that I’ve been eager to get started or I’ve been struggling to get through [laughter]. I would say that would definitely be a time of joy. [Judy] For many women, challenging activities became progressively easier with time, as they incorporated them into their daily routine. Zena, who has a chronic illness, spoke about her experiences with Pilates and yoga. Sometimes I can’t do all of it and sometimes have to do it in a variation but I’ve realized that’s okay. I go to some yoga classes, where we learn to adapt the poses with bolsters, and at first I couldn’t get down into a child’s pose and I had to use a bolster, but slowly, as I went week after week after week, I could actually get into a child’s pose. My joints would allow me to do that. So it was a slow, measurable progress with my body. [Zena] Women enjoyed challenging themselves in physical activities, as well as completing other tasks. I was trying to benchmark for a 6k and I went through my regular trail but I made a bit of a detour. There was a bit of an incline, but after I saw the incline I felt kind of a sense of, I don’t know, for me it’s kind of a push and pull while I’m running where, especially when you’re on your own you’re tempted to, okay I’ll take break. It’s okay [laughter]. But just to complete the course… I still have that reserve of energy so why not just kind of power through it… when I’ve completed a project of mine that I’ve been… struggling to get through. I would say that would definitely be a time of joy [laughter]. My last painting that I completed was at the end of April. Completion just felt really good. I usually am a night person so I’ll probably stay up all through the night to finish a project. Just a sense of accomplishment that I’ve finished what I set out to do… even the process feels very rewarding and it allows me to experiment and do different things.… different techniques… different brushes, and I use different knives and objects to create
109 different textures as well. So that’s a new thing that I’ve done to use a lot more texture than I have in the past. [Judy] This does not imply that the learning process was always smooth and seamless. Several participants noted they struggled with the learning process that was necessary in order to engage in particular joyful body experiences.
I learned how to scuba dive a while ago and it was stressful learning how… The actual diving was extremely joyful. But learning how to dive and you have to worry about not stopping breathing because the pressure can mess up your lungs, you have to worry about going, descending and ascending slowly because you can mess up your ear… was not joyful. [Radha] However, women’s growth and movement towards reaching their goals also, and primarily, involved a sense of confidence and enhanced self-esteem. I cycle pretty well every day. There’s a couple things for me that make it very joyful and very positive. For me it’s depending on the season, it’s either the joy of being the only one out there because I can rough it and I can do it and challenge myself and either be the first one out in the season or the last one still going. Not that it’s competitive in any way. Just that it’s like, oh, I can do this. [Ophelia] In the focus group, Kalli directly commented on the link between her growth and her selfesteem. It happens to be something that you enjoy and you find personal reward or growth from. I think that builds a certain level of comfort with yourself as well as the confidence and I think that grounds us so that it doesn’t really matter what other people think because I enjoy doing this and I’m proud that I can do this. [Kalli]
110 An element of being capable involved women achieving a sense of mastery or expertise, which occurred as women developed proficiency, often becoming experts in their joyful activities. For example, several women opened businesses related to their activities. I work as a photographer.… It’s pretty challenging in a way that I enjoy because it’s social and yet technical. It takes a lot of experience to master all kinds of techniques and then I have to make up my own.… I have a pretty broad knowledge base. I have friends who call me to help them out with tough situations and I feel that’s very complimentary because it means people trust me. They feel that they can come to me for advice. I think for me that’s very encouraging… a lot of people ask me what camera should I buy. I feel like I’m kind of a teacher. [Gemma] This concludes the Growth theme of the dimension of Experiences of Joy in the Body. 3.3. Liberation Liberation is the third theme of the core dimension Experience of Joy in the Body. Women’s experiences of Liberation involved a sense of freedom from both physical and emotional constraints combined with pleasurable, triumphant experiences when engaged in joyful activities. Liberation includes the sub-themes of Celebration, Freedom of Movement, and Independence (see Figure 3 for the delineation of sub-themes within the theme of Liberation). Figure 3. Sub-themes within the theme of Liberation.
Liberation
Celebration
Freedom of Movement
Independence
111 3.3.1. Celebration. A sense of Celebration imbued many participants’ joyful body experiences. Most participants spoke about being extraordinarily happy when engaged in their joyful body experiences and noted that they were able to fully engage with the pleasure they derived from their experiences without filtering the pleasure through a lens of shame. Celebration involved a sense of energy being created and released and a sense of playfulness and fun, with a focus on heightened positive emotion and passion. Participants experienced lasting favourable feelings, such as happiness, as a result of their joyful body experiences. Through joyful body experiences they connected to their body with positive emotion, including feeling increased energy and optimism. A sense of boldness was also noted by several participants. Heightened positive emotion often involved specific events that were memorable and positive. I was at a concert, one of my favourite bands, and I just danced like crazy. And I have never danced that hard at a concert before and I normally get really hot and I don’t like to sweat, but I didn’t care. It was that much fun. And that was awesome. It was a freeing feeling… It was really great ’cause it was an overall feeling of well-being and pleasure and all my senses could—I mean, I was moving and the ground was pounding and I could hear, there was flashing lights and it was really nice. [Tali] Anticipation of joyful body experiences was noted by several participants, and was focused on a variety of types of activities, from travel to listening to new music to food consumption. Additionally, most participants described having experienced positive emotions through daily activities, even activities that are typically considered routine. In particular, a sense of excitement and satisfaction was associated with eating and cooking for oneself and others. Jade described her childhood socioeconomic status as working class, and as an adult she described herself as having access to financial privilege. I like whatever it is that I choose… that feeling of creating something that’s wonderful and consuming it, this creation consumption thing, it’s really
112 pleasurable… And you think about it as in “what am I going to eat next?” This very anticipatory, looking forward to it. [Jade] The experience of food consumption was often shared with others. Kalli spoke about going to a restaurant with a friend. In Montreal we went to this vegetarian with fake duck and the whole time “mm, it’s so crisp and fresh,” and we had white wine, “oh, this is so good.” And we’ll spend hours eating, just enjoying the experience. [Kalli] Physical activities were also associated with positive feelings and fun. Radha identified her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian. I was listening to some spiritual music, some Sufi Qawwali music that I love. It’s one of my favourite forms of music and is one of my favourite artists. And the song is about celebrating life, love, god, everything and you cannot, for me, you cannot help but move in that way… So I just threw my hands up and got into a little bhangra, which is what we do… I got filled with the joy of the music, and maybe that music entered me, and I felt happy, and it extended from my head to my toes and I had to move it to a beat… it started maybe from my centre or my heart, and definitely on my face I was definitely smiling and responding to a vibe I felt throughout my body. [Radha] In the focus group, Kalli noted her love of yoga. I feel a sense of liberation with yoga. My body feels good… just the process of doing it just makes me so happy… I just love doing it… at the end of the day it just feels good so I keep doing it. [Kalli] In addition to the association of the sub-theme of Celebration with positive experiences, the women described a sense of passion as they engaged in joyful body experiences. Passion extended to a wide variety of types of activity, from sports to politics to travel and dancing. As
113 Nimco noted, “It’s having a passion for things that you like to do or that make you feel good about yourself.” 3.3.2. Freedom of Movement. Freedom of Movement is the second sub-theme under the theme of Liberation. Freedom of Movement involved a physical sense of freedom, vitality, strength, and body awareness through kinaesthetics. Most participants identified a sense of physical freedom through moving their bodies. I need to take a belly dance class, need to take a swing class. Even if I’m just dancing in my own home, I need to move my body because, if I don’t move my body, that’s when the blocks happen… So movement was a huge, huge thing for me. [Zena] Movement was a common thread in the women’s activities through travel, biking, dance, swimming, or other activities. Hula hooping [laughter]. There is something really sexy and sensual and strong about hula hooping that I really love, lifting it up and bringing it back down and moving it… I feel like I have a lot of power when I do that… It just feels really good to kind of move in those circles and have the hula-hoop as a guide of those circles. I just love the way it feels going around my body and especially when, I love the feeling of lifting it up and having it up on my arms and walking down a street and doing that and just the way people look at you. I just like the strong feeling of moving it in front of me. It almost feels like a bit of a, it makes me think of poy which is like a warrior.… You have to have really good rhythm with your body to do different hula hooping. [Ostara] The women described a sense of physical vitality and strength, focused on physically demanding activities such as rowing and bicycling. Tali spoke about swimming: “It feels really nice to cut through the water. I really like feeling my body’s power. I really like that because
114 that’s something I’m proud of, that my body is really strong.” Women described experiencing pleasure in the physical actions in certain joyful body experiences. I would say the times when I feel not just happy or content but actually an extraordinary feeling of happiness or joyfulness would be when I’m doing something physical where it’s the actual action of doing that that makes me feel really good. So, for example, when I’m rowing, I feel really strong, and it just makes me feel really good, so that kind of thing is how I would see a joyful experience. Something where an action or a motion, something physical, makes me feel great. [Pamelia] Joyful body experiences related to Freedom of Movement also included heightened body awareness during movement. With rowing it’s so precise, everything has to be in exactly the right place for the boat to be balanced, for you not to catch your oar or cause a mistake, so just having to think about where I am all the time, I’ve just been really conscious of where everything is, especially my arms, I would say, but pretty much everything. You just have to be really aware of movement, which I really like.… I find with rowing and cycling it’s actually a time when I feel, first of all, I’m thinking about my body, and what it’s doing, especially in rowing, I just have to concentrate on making my body go as long and as hard as I can for a long time. Same with cycling. It’s not quite as focused or based on technique, but if I’m biking up a big hill, I’m really aware of what my muscles are doing, and I really feel it, I’m just really aware of what my body is doing. [Pamelia] Other activities mentioned in relation to heightened body awareness included bicycling and yoga. Kalli commented on her experience of balancing on a slack line: “It makes me really focus on what I need to do and I’m learning so much about my body. Every little step matters. I can be balanced for a fraction of a second more and I’m really happy.” As Radha described, heightened awareness also relates to engaging in more unusual physical activities.
115 The joy of hiking and feeling heightened senses, which I tend to feel in the woods. I studied these animals in these parameters and you do kind of get a sixth sense about being able to tell where animals are or where dangerous things, snakes and things, might be. You’re trying to keep up with animals that jump in trees, you do feel your heart beating so you’re very aware of your physicality, and it’s hot and it’s sweaty, and you feel strong, I felt strong… you recognize a more animalness of the body, of my body, I have, and it’s been really exciting to feel that way… it’s just the actual work of doing physically I really like. [Radha] 3.2.3 Independence. The third sub-theme under the theme of Liberation is Independence. Specific joyful body experiences often involved interactions with other people and building a sense of community. However, the women often described joyful body experiences as being comprised of a sense of self-determination and emotional freedom from constraints, as well as a capacity to rely on oneself and one’s own body rather than depending on outside resources. Nimco, for example, is a parent. Following the birth of her children, she experienced an increased need to feel independent. What I was finding was with children and being married and working full time and going to school, there isn’t a lot of opportunity to reflect. You are constantly just, I was just run off my feet. No opportunity to really think of what I was thinking myself or how I was feeling because you are always meeting someone else’s needs. I think being by myself kind of helps to ground me again, to think about myself a little bit… I have had the opportunity to go back to do some soul searching, a little bit of thinking about what I like to do and what I like to enjoy because right now it is all about the family.… I find just doing tasks and just working and kids and so on, it does kind of take over, life becomes have-tos instead of want-tos… I just want some peace to talk and something for me. [Nimco]
116 For some women, joyful body experiences included the experience of the body as useful in independently pursuing a range of activities. The experience of the body as useful was not linked to women’s able-bodiedness, but rather to their perception that their bodies were useful in engaging in the activities that were relevant to them. Earlier in their lives, several women had experienced their bodies as not useful when they were not proficient in sports; however, these women were subsequently able to discover other types of activity whereby they experienced their bodies as useful. We did musical theatre and I was able to sing again, so it started becoming this very involved thing that I was good at and could physically use myself and I think that’s one thing that I felt, like my body was useless ’cause I wasn’t good at sports. [Jade] In contrast, other women have had a longstanding sense that their body was useful. Often, they engaged in activities that were useful and practical. For some women, this involved activities such as sewing and creating their own personal care products; however, for others, it related to physical activities, such as biking as a mode of transportation. Ophelia noted, “I cycle pretty well every day. There’re a couple things for me that make it very joyful and very positive… biking is my thing. It gets me where I’m going and I’m busy.” Indeed, several women described joyful body experiences as related to a sense of independence from common dependency on transportation. Cycling… I just really love doing it, and I love the feeling of using my own power and force to get myself from home to work or wherever I’m going and actually do that myself instead of depending on a car or subway or whatever. So, it’s sort of just a feeling of power, of independence really, being able to do something for myself, and it’s just me, it’s just my own body and how I use it and that can help me accomplish something… it still feels really good to be able to do that, and I feel really lucky to be able to do that, too, because a lot of people can’t. [Pamelia]
117 Independence also referred to a sense of being responsible for one’s own life. Kalli stated, “always be the source of your happiness.” She expanded on this during the focus group discussion. You end up being comfortable with yourself because you are enjoying something that you do for yourself, it’s being independent, providing yourself happiness, as opposed to having some circumstances, something other outside of yourself that you can’t control always be the source of your happiness. [Kalli] Other women spoke about a sense of freedom and liberation. I have been really wanting to do long distance biking for a while, so I got myself a good bike… I just decided to plan to bike to [city 30 kilometres away] and then biked back and doing the biking along the countryside it just—I know you are working out and there are endorphins pumping and your whole body is like, whoa, but it just felt so good and I felt so much closer to reality than just driving through it being kind of shielded from it. It was like, this beautiful sky and this beautiful farm field, and here I am biking and moving through it and feeling so strong, like I can do anything. It had this very liberating feeling to it, to be able to do that. [Ostara] The experience of Independence through freedom was also referred to as freedom from common restrictions. Gemma identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual; she was married to a man and widowed. I’m free. I feel free. I feel a lot of freedom to say what I want, to do what I like. I don’t have anybody upset at what I’m doing. I’m basically exploring and absorbing and I love it. Even being on a bus, I can go anywhere. I can wake up in the morning and go, “Okay I’m going to get on the bus and go to Belgium,” or anywhere, and just have that complete and total freedom. Freedom from a lot of things. [Gemma]
118 This concludes the results regarding the third theme of Experiences of Joy in the Body, namely, Liberation. This theme included the sub-themes of Celebration, Freedom of Movement, and Independence. 3.4. Thriving The fourth and final theme of Experiences of Joy in the Body is Thriving. Thriving involved a sense of agency and power, as well as the experience that a variety of components of the joyful activity were aligning perfectly. Thriving contains the sub-themes of Empowerment and Congruity (see Figure 4 for a delineation of the sub-themes within Thriving).
Figure 4. Sub-themes within the theme of Thriving.
Thriving
Empowerment
Congruity
3.4.1. Empowerment. Women’s Thriving through joyful body experiences involved a deep sense of Empowerment. This included a focus on their sense of agency, affirming the person they are and appreciation of their unique selves through being themselves and loving themselves. For several participants, the experience of joy was associated with their experience of themselves as powerful, rather than fearful or weak. Zena experienced this as a holistic practitioner. Zena reported that she has been diagnosed with multiple chronic health conditions. I’m a very powerful person… women healers go through a huge thing of, oh, my God! This is so big… all my totems, they’re all prey animals and they all scare
119 the shit out of me. I’ve got a cougar, I’ve got a wolf, I’ve got a bear and they’re all huge and they have really big teeth and, for me to be able to understand that that power, that fierceness, is something that I have in me is a huge responsibility because it basically says, if you are this big and this powerful, what right do you have to cower in front of something or someone? Even if you do, you don’t have to do that. You have power that’s big enough to be brave all the time and I don’t feel brave all the time but, when I need to be brave, I will be brave and that’s something that I had to allow myself to do. [Zena] Similarly, Ostara expressed a sense of agency and power in relation to a community project. I organized this community gardening group in [city in Southern Ontario]. We have been setting up this really big plot which we have had to do a lot of soil prep—so renting a sod cutter and digging beds, and so I have been doing all this laborious work all the time too and my body I think is feeling really, I don’t know, worked and muscular but not necessarily trying to be muscular. I just feel very strong and empowered. I feel like I can do anything. [Ostara] Several women noted the importance of affirming who they were through engagement in joyful body experiences. Nimco identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual; she is married to a man and has children. If I stop playing soccer I find for me it’s like, oh, well I can’t just do work and home. It’s not me. I need something else to do.… Because you need something or some other way to relieve your, just have other ways of affirming the person you are. Because work, if you are not happy with your job or you are stressed with it or you are not too happy with what is happening at home, at least you have another outlet. So it’s like a triangle. You have something else to balance you… there is just too much more pressure to work and to do all of these other things on top of your job and you need to find some other way of validating yourself as person. [Nimco]
120 Women experienced appreciation of their unique selves and loving themselves. This was expressed in a variety of ways, including amazement with their bodies, and emerged through a variety of experiences. I feel like it can come in lots of different ways, almost like sometimes it’s a joyful experience of wow, I’m alive, and it feels great to be in this body, or almost like an existence of wow, this is my body. What a beautiful thing this is. Other times it is very, it’s like, wow, I feel so strong, and not strong because I have worked out or anything but just strong because of the things I have been doing. [Ostara] 3.4.2. Congruity. The theme of Thriving also included the sub-theme of Congruity, whereby all elements of the women’s experiences, as well as the external social and physical environment, felt as though they had coalesced. Only things that I really love doing, so something like rowing, where I feel like I’m really good at it, and it’s fun, and I’m in a place that I love being, like being out on the water, being outside, being with people I like, but then actually using my body to do something, like move that quickly over the water, and it just feels really graceful and beautiful, and I really love that. [Pamelia] Often participants identified that this sense of Congruity particularly occurred with their most favoured joyful body activity. I play all kinds of sports but soccer has been my love… being outdoors, being with other people. I find it is a great stress reliever because I don’t have to worry about anything else besides just enjoying that moment with the people that I am playing with. I am definitely very competitive, so of course there is always that edge of wanting to win, and also playing well. The other thing that I think for me that I enjoy about soccer, it’s a team sport, too. One of the things that I love is working as a team with other people. Creating something with others, I love that piece of it. I am not the best soccer player in the world. I am actually a better
121 basketball player than a soccer player, but it doesn’t compare. There is just something about soccer for me that just, it brings me peace. [Nimco] Other participants experienced Congruity through music or dancing. Ostara identified her ethnocultural heritage as being Canadian. I get a really good body feeling when I play drums, hand drums… just playing the hand drum and feeling the whole music of the whole area just kind of vibrating through my body. It was again this connected feeling of being connected to people and also feeling like, wow, this body is so amazing and my hands feel so strong playing this drum, and again I am expressing rhythm… playing drums anytime, but specifically when I was with people that I really, really trust. We have this very understanding dynamic when we are playing and singing together. [Ostara] This concludes the results regarding the fourth theme of Experiences of Joy in the Body, namely, Thriving, which included the sub-themes of Empowerment and Congruity. Summary In summary, this chapter on women’s Experiences of Joy in the Body reflected the ways in which women described and defined their embodied experiences of joy. These definitions were grouped into the themes of Attunement, Growth, Liberation, and Thriving. Women experienced a sense of awareness in the moment when they were engaged in their joyful experience. They had a deep understanding of their own needs when engaged in joyful activities, and they experienced a sense of connection between their mind and their body. Without judgment, women accepted the needs that emerged as part of this Attunement, which enabled them to let go, be at ease, and trust themselves in the moment of engagement in joyful body experiences. Women experienced Growth whereby, through joyful body experiences, they were building towards their own personal goals and learning through their activities and experiences.
122 They also experienced motivation and enjoyment through their own learning processes. Women challenged themselves and were proud of their sense of mastery of the skills involved in their joyful body activities. Women’s experiences of Liberation were characterized by a sense of celebration, which included an emotional response focused on positive feelings as a result of joyful body experiences, as well as freedom of movement, and a physical sense of vitality and strength through engagement in physically demanding activities. The experience of Liberation also incorporated a sense of independence and a sense of freedom, both physical and emotional. Women experienced Thriving when they focused on their own agency in joyful activities. Finally, during their joyful body activities they experienced a sense that all of the various elements of their joyful activity had come together into a deeply satisfying whole experience.
Chapter Four - Creating Environments that Nurture Joy The Creating Environments that Nurture Joy core category is the second of the four core categories that emerged in the analysis of participants’ narratives about their experiences of joy. Creating Environments that Nurture Joy reflects the ways in which women actively valued and practiced their joyful body experiences by integrating them into their lives. When women utilized their agency to create environments that nurtured joy, their internal experiences shaped their choices, routines, and daily activities and they connected with others to create spaces of joy. I like the wind in the hair and I bike really early in the morning ’cause I go to work around 5:45. So it’s basically you. And I live really close to a park, so that’s the way I go to get to work. So it’s you, the park and the birds. It’s really, really nice and just the motion—you’re so used to biking that it’s like an extension of yourself. So you just go and go and go. [Krishna] Through women’s detailed descriptions, a number of elements emerged that were common to women’s engagement in creating environments that nurtured joyful body experiences. The core category of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy contains the themes of Space For Myself, Internal Environments, and Social Relationships. These themes, as well as sub-themes, will be discussed in detail in this chapter (see Figure 5 for the delineation of themes under the core category of Creating Environments That Nurture Joy).
Figure 5. Themes within the core dimension of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy.
Creating Environments that Nurture Joy Space for Myself
Internal Environments
123
Social Relationships
124 4.1. Space for Myself The first theme of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy involved the experience of creating Space for Myself. When women created space for themselves, spaces that nurtured joy, they decided to shift their external environments in ways that enabled them to create space that was responsive to their passions and was conducive to their engagement in regular and ongoing practices of joyful body experiences. Space for Myself included the sub-themes of Safe Space, Frequent Diversified Engagement, and The Natural World (see Figure 6 for the delineation of sub-themes under the theme of Space for Myself.)
Figure 6. Sub-themes within the theme of Space for Myself.
Space for Myself
Safe Space
Frequent Diversified Engagement
The Natural World
4.1.1. Safe Space. In order to engage in joyful body experiences, women needed to be in the world in a way that responded to their need for safety. Indeed, safety was essential for an activity to be defined as joyful. An element of safety was women’s engagement in self-protection. The women did not experience safety at all times and many had experienced adverse events, including violence. However, each of these women engaged in joyful activities in at least several spaces that felt physically, emotionally, and socially safe to them. Radha expressly stated that joyful body experiences occurred only in environments that included physical safety; “it needs to be a systemic change societally. So if girls could feel safe at any time of day anywhere…and women
125 didn’t have to worry about being preyed upon.” In the focus group, women addressed the gendered nature of physical safety, as Gemma mentioned that she had considered embarking on a motorcycle trip. Gemma: I was talking to a guy and I said, “It’s different for you. You can go around the world on a motorcycle and even if I went and did the same trip and I had the same knowledge and the same skills, I could fix my own motorcycle, it would be a different journey.” Kalli: For sure. Gemma: And through nothing that I do, but just from what happens to me. Kalli: Right, agreed. Gemma: The inherent risks and dangers of being able to interact with people on my own. I think there would be some things I wouldn’t be able to do or get away with just because I’m not a guy. The establishment of safety was a central concern for women who lived in developing nations at some point in their lives. Ann described her ethnocultural heritage as Brown and Caribbean of South Asian Ancestry. As a child, she emigrated with her family from Canada to a Caribbean island, and as a youth she and her family returned to Canada. Ann described her experience of living in the Caribbean. There is a lot of crime there and it wasn’t a nice place to be. I was very miserable there. It wasn’t safe being a girl. Even just walking home from school, people harassing you. There’s a lot of rape. There’s a lot of violence, and there’s a lot of racism and sexism and homophobia. [Ann] Several women experienced relatively few challenges with regards to their social context, either as children or as adults, creating an inherent sense of Safe Space. Pamelia described her socioeconomic status as a child as economically comfortable.
126 Having a really stable home, by having parents and extended family who I knew I could depend on and who loved me… really helped me accept who I am and just be able to try new things and be able to take risks and not worry too much about anything…we were always comfortable growing up… I think that feeds into being generally confident. We had the things we needed growing up in every way, not just financially, but had a lot of love and support, so that had a lot to do with it. [Pamelia] However, other women experienced being or feeling unsafe within their social environment and strove to take action in order to create safer space, which enabled them to then re-engage in joyful body activities. Gemma described her sexual orientation as heterosexual; she was married to a man and subsequently widowed. I got kicked out of the country because my husband had died. They said, “You don’t have a spouse anymore.” I was very unhappy in my city because I needed to find work. There were a lot of things I had to do. When I went on vacation, I had gotten a job, things had stabilized, I’d taken care of all the legal stuff and everything was under control. Once everything was under control and I could go away on my birthday, it was like “Okay, now I need to do something for myself.” [Gemma] For women who experienced heath, illness, or disability, protecting themselves often related to their illness. Zena described her experience with multiple chronic health conditions. My [chronic illness] is saying, “I’m going to give you a hint and if you don’t get off the street right now I’m going to take over and I’m going to hurt you” and then I didn’t listen to it. “No, no, no, no. If you keep doing this, I’m going to hurt you even more” and I didn’t listen to it. And then, “Okay. No, no, no. I’m going to make you wish that you were dead [laughter]. You will not have a choice. I will put you on your back.” … Okay. If my pain is going to get loud, it obviously has something to tell me, therefore, it’s in no-one’s best interest if I keep pushing at this point even though I am stupidly stubborn sometimes and sometimes I do need to push through because I don’t have a choice because sometimes that’s life but, if
127 I can say, “Whoa. Everything stops now. I take care of myself because, if I don’t, I know what's going to happen and you don’t want to see me [laughter] when it happens.” [Zena] Women who had experienced difficulties with health and illness also identified ways of transforming their bodies into Safe Space. [chronic illness] is constant pain and I had 18 out of 18 trigger points. It was widespread pain everywhere so I did not trust my body. I didn’t trust my body not to hurt me. I didn’t trust my body to be in control when I wanted to be in control. It was always a battle of wills. So, what yoga taught me was that I had to be in and stay in and say, “No, no, no. This is my body and even though I’m freaking out right now, if I can let it pass, then I’ll be okay.” [Zena] Ostara was born with a genetic disorder that resulted in some alterations of appearance and of perception, and noted that she was teased and ostracised at school. Consequently, she shifted her social environment, which created a sense of safety: “It was a reclaiming of it’s fine to be this way and there is nothing wrong with it, and adapting environments to meet me instead of me adapting myself to meet them.”
Swimming was mentioned by several participants as a Safe Space in childhood and also adulthood. It provided space to explore capabilities in their bodies that they could not explore elsewhere in their lives. I grew up with three cousins who were all boys, two of them were older then me, and so there was always this very rough and tumble element, and I was a bit of a tomboy, so it was always like this moment where I felt like we could connect on a better level, because outside the pool there’s no way that I could still play with them, except for my younger cousin, because they were hick kids, and they fought hard, and I couldn’t be like that, because my family wouldn’t let me because I was a girl, but also because I was a city kid and I was terrified [laughter]. [Jade]
128 Safe Space was particularly essential in exploring sexuality. Pamelia identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual, and was in a monogamous relationship with a man at the time of the interview. I had a boyfriend for a long time in high school, and I’ve often thought that that was a really good thing. He was the one that I did all that exploring with sexually, and a lot of people don’t have that chance. A chance to do that in a really safe way. So I feel really lucky to have been able to do all that physical exploration with one person who I trusted…in as safe a way as it can be. [Pamelia] Several participants noted that journaling was a Safe Space where they engaged in emotional expression and creative writing. As a child, Krishna immigrated to Canada from South Asia with her family. I have a journal…I don’t tend to talk about problems with family members ’cause I guess you’d term it, I’m introverted in a sense. So I like to work out things myself and then go talk to the family directly before I—or talk to my sister. So I tend to, if I need to sort something out, then I’ll just sit there and write it out and go through what I was feeling or what I think I should be doing. And eventually I get a set plan and then I’m oh, okay, this works, let’s go. [Krishna] Use of journaling was particularly noted by women from cultural spaces where they described emotional expression as not being acceptable. Nimco was born in East Africa; as a child she immigrated to Canada with her family. I generally have in the past, I grew up in a more traditional culture where you don’t really talk about feelings a lot… also my personality isn’t, I am not a huge touchy feely kind of person. So journaling has given me the opportunity to, if I wanted to write about emotions or thoughts that maybe I wasn’t as comfortable sharing with others, that would be an opportunity to write those. Yeah, and also it was a way for me to reflect onto my experiences. [Nimco]
129 Other women shared their experience of writing on blogs or websites where they controlled the content and commenting. During the focus group, Gemma referred to her online writing, “lots and lots of positive experiences have come about from writing, simply writing about what I think in a place where I can do whatever I want.”
With regards to self-protection, women protected themselves in a variety of ways in order to develop a sense of emotional safety, particularly by creating boundaries with other people in their lives. Zena has several chronic health conditions. I was just an open wound and I think the only way that I was able to successfully have protection against that was to build up the inner confidence and to sit in my power so firmly that I eventually got myself to the place that I was the tree even though the storm was going on around me. I think that’s the only way that you can do it because, if you don’t do it from the ground up, I think you don’t believe it. I think it’s hard to trust it. So, being with people that are not horrible [laughter], is one major right. Avoid the assholes. I had to learn to do that… If you’re going to do work, you need to be with people that are going to reinforce the work that you’re doing otherwise you automatically make it much harder for you than it actually has to be.… I went from never being in my body, always having things be a panicked outside of the body feeling to a “No. I can be in my body and I can experience this, and I can be safe because I will protect myself.” [Zena] Self-protection also often entailed leaving negative situations. Kalli identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian-Asian. I have an aversion to stress and I have the body awareness to sense it. So when I start feeling this tension here or I’m getting a bit headachy or just it’s not comfortable, I’m very sensitive to that and it’s, it’s got to stop. If I just sense a sort of burden, it’s a negative thing for me in a sense, a negative quality, and so I move from it… I invested, for example grappling, seven years in becoming a pretty proficient [martial art] practitioner. I was a purple belt, was respected, and then suddenly I decided, I don’t like this competition business, I don’t like what
130 it’s doing to me, it’s stressing me out, it’s time to let it go. And everyone was shocked. “You’ve gotten so far, why would you invest all this time and suddenly leave?” And it’s like well, because I don’t get attached to stuff. And this is in my personality, even boyfriends, all throughout my life it’s, it’s not working for me and I move on. And I take whatever I learn from it in the present moment and I just move forward. [Kalli] Doing everything in their power to ensure they succeeded was another essential element of protection and creating Safe Space. Often, women focused on increasing positive experiences. So it’s not just setting your limits, it’s also what are my healthy pleasures, what am I doing to make me feel beautiful or sexy or smart or all those kinds of things and actually engaging in those positive—so it’s almost like I wanted to say, “This is the environment I’m used to and this is not helping me. I need to find a new environment that’s going to be really supportive.” [Zena] 4.1.2. Frequent Diversified Engagement. All of the women described regularly engaging in joyful body experiences. They also incorporated novel and varied joyful body experiences into their lives. Zena described her experience as consistently being “in my joy.” Most women engaged in their favourite joyful body experiences on a daily basis; as Kalli stated, “Yoga. Every day I practice. It’s my favourite thing to do every day.” All participants created space and time in which to engage in these activities regularly, at least several times per week. Most women had a list of their most prominent and enjoyable joyful body experiences. For example, Gemma stated: “My top three, I have many hobbies but my top three, travel is number one, number two is photography, number three is aviation.” The women demonstrated a high degree of creativity in their capacity to frequently incorporate joyful body experiences into their lives. Women often integrated joyful body experiences into their working lives, which afforded them the opportunity to engage in these
131 activities on an ongoing basis and in a paid capacity. This was a decision each of the women made; to seek or create work that was satisfying and fulfilling and that specifically involved joyful body experiences. The type of work varied widely, from research interests to physically constructing hula-hoops to photography to holistic practice. This has been my professional life, understanding somebody’s right to be well and to make decisions. So, academically, there were abundant opportunities for me to learn about all the different aspects of wellness, mental, emotional, financial, sexual, religious, spiritual, whatever they were and, for me to look at all those points of wellness and understand where I was on those… It’s so great to be a practitioner because I always know I can do exchanges with my massage friends or my Reiki practitioner friends and I am constantly getting that care which is a really, really nice part of being a holistic person is having a holistic network. So I’m always getting massages. [Zena] Women incorporated their joyful body experiences into a wide variety of types of work. Radha described her experience doing research. You’ve spent all this time and years studying something, and you have this theoretical framework, and then you’re physically doing that, and you’re in surroundings that you happen to love, and you’re interacting or studying some creature that you love, and you’ve got to be going under and over trees and vines and things like that, and you’ve got to keep up, and you’ve got your timer beeping about methodology of everything, so it’s all of that. [Radha] Other women limited their time at paid work in order to more deeply and frequently engage in joyful activities. I’m still nowhere closer to understanding what my career is all supposed to be about, but I’m okay with not knowing. I’m actually more excited about just finding out as things grow. And maybe it’s always going to be this ongoing changing thing. And so the reason why I’m okay with that is because I’ve got yoga to ground me. I always have something to come back to… I’m still not
132 making a lot of money, because I choose not to do the nine-to-five thing. Just working jobs that I enjoy and keep experiencing new things and learning things and so I’m maybe doing that indefinitely. At this point, that’s how I see the rest of my life unfolding. [Kalli] Most of the women noted the importance of continually engaging in their favourite joyful body activities, while also engaging in an ongoing process of searching in determining what joyful activities to incorporate into their lives. Pamelia noted, “that’s hard to do is to figure out what you even like. You just don’t know for a while until you’ve tried a lot of things.” Several participants particularly mentioned enjoying new activities and sensations, such as cooking new meals or eating new foods. Ann stated, “I like going to restaurants, and I really go to restaurants a lot. So I really enjoy trying new things and new flavours.” Similarly, Gemma spoke about the importance of new experiences. I think it came from just throwing myself out into the world, basically. Trial by fire. I’ve had many trials by fire. I’ve had very many experiences that are new… confidence building is good because it depends on what you think is going to build your confidence. Some people are very confident in their career but they’re not confident in dating. Because I’ve tried a lot of things, I’ve tried a little bit of everything, it’s like a big smorgasbord of experiences, I have some knowledge. I have a pretty broad knowledge base. [Gemma] Similarly, Kalli spoke about having sought new experiences, although as she has aged she has determined which activities she prefers. I’m all about exploring different skills and seeing what I like and don’t like, and I think that would define my 20s; I’m 35 now… I’m not saying I have my shit together, but I’m much more okay with whatever I am. So in my 20s I was just trying to figure out now, what are my interests? I’ll try that and see if I’m good at it, if I like it. [Kalli]
133 Women tried new activities, even when those activities were a challenge. I don’t run. I bike but I don’t run. But this summer I decided to give it a try. ’Cause I always thought it was impossible for me to run ’cause it was just like “running, so much extra work.” Whereas biking, you get on the bike and you just go… But once I got going I was like wow, I can do this. Sweet!… It started out kinda like okay; let’s take it easy. So it started out, it did hurt a bit ’cause you're not used to this when my legs started hurting. But then I was like you know what, you can do it ’cause you’ve got this far. And then afterwards the pain just kinda went away. And I’m like, okay, we can do this. And I just kept going. [Krishna] Other women commented that they enjoyed trying new activities that were not their typical activities. I also was working up toward running five kilometres… I really like the joy of being in my body and using it in ways that I don’t necessarily do every single day or I didn’t grow up learning to do. And exploring new sensations and feelings about oh, I can run this faster if I do this, my body will respond this way. Yoga is like that where you’re in a position and you’re like, I didn’t even know that muscle existed. [Radha] 4.1.3. The Natural World. All of the women practiced joyful body experiences that connected them to The Natural World. While all participants lived in urban centres at the time of the interviews, they all found ways to engage in joyful activities in nature, and they created spaces for themselves that satisfied their need to be outdoors. Just being outdoors I think for me is something that I have always cherished. I grew up in a small town as well so being outside has always been a good thing…when I play soccer I feel free. I know some people think, “well, you’re chasing a ball. What’s the big deal?” But for me I think it is just being outdoors… enjoying the fresh air… some people relax by being inside and I think for me my way of relaxing is being outside. [Nimco]
134 Several women noted that being outdoors allowed them to slow down, observe their surroundings, and connect to the natural world. Kalli identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian-Asian. I would rather do yoga outdoors and breathe in the fresh air. Slackline, because it’s with trees, I’m outdoors. So I can spend hours just being in a park and just being in nature and the quietness of nature, too. Yeah, so I love anything outdoors, really. I walk a lot. [Kalli] Women also purposefully created quiet spaces for themselves in the city that felt more natural and serene than the typical bustling urban environment. I found that it was a bit of a release for me… the trails that I take, they’re more scenic and very away from traffic and a little bit secluded. So it’s that connection with nature that I find that really helps me to get that sense of calm… the routes that I usually do take, there’s usually water and even just the sound of rustling wind versus the high traffic, [laughter] sirens, every other—so I think it’s a nice kind of escape. [Judy] Those who had regular access to rural spaces spent time in those settings. For example, Pamelia, who identified her ethnocultural heritage as White and her family’s socioeconomic status as financially comfortable, had access to cottages and homes in a scenic cottage locale. I really like being in the outdoors, especially out of the city… So any chance I have to be outside and away from the city, I really try to take advantage of it… out in the country… I just feel connected to nature. [Pamelia] Several women related their rejection of mainstream beauty ideals to their connection with The Natural World. I would say the type of spirituality I experience with the earth and I found this magicalness with natural places that probably affected how I view and want my body to be. I want to emulate that naturalness. It kind of grows and it becomes its
135 own and it is untouched by these commercial things that take away from that understanding of the world… the more connected I get to the earth and learning about different plants and the environment and the ecological world… It just feels absurd to be wearing heels and makeup while in a forest. It just feels so contrasting and foreign and plastic to me. [Ostara] To conclude, the theme Space for Myself included three sub-themes associated with the experience of creating space, namely, Safe Space, Frequent Diversified Engagement, and The Natural World.
4.2. Internal Environments The second theme of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy involved the experience of connecting to Internal Environments, specifically with an intentional focus on internal experiences. This theme included the sub-themes of Reading the Body, Personal Meaning, and Choice (see Figure 7 for a delineation of the themes of Internal Environments). Figure 7. Sub-themes within the theme of Internal Environments.
Internal Environments Reading the Body
Personal Meaning
Choice
4.2.1. Reading the Body. For all of the women, connecting to their inner world involved a focus on their body experiences and feelings. Further, Reading the Body often involved a decision women made to engage with embodied joy in a manner that reflected a profound respect for, and responsiveness to their needs, wants, and appetites.
136 Several participants identified their focus on their inner world as a process of learning to focus on internal cues to eat. A focus on identifying internal cues to prompt eating appeared to be particularly relevant to women who had dieted in the past. I recently completed a program with a size positive nutritionist… I’ve always really, really loved eating and really loved food. But when it comes with so much baggage, or sometimes even if it comes with confusion—even if you decide there’s nothing moral about eating, food is just food, but you don’t know what you should be eating or when or how, I can eat this if I want it, but do I actually want it? What’s going on? Do I want more, do I not want more? And when you know, it’s really nice. So now I know the early signs of hunger and I can figure that out. And so now when I go through early stages of hunger and get to think about what would be great to eat right now and then find that exact thing and then eat it and go, “oh, that was so good.” You just enjoy it so much more. I find that my stomach feels really good and everything just feels really good. [Tali] All women referred to the importance of being focussed on their internal cues. Zena experienced several chronic health conditions. If your body needs things, it will ask you for them.… if I have this feeling again I know what I need. Basically, it’s creating a more effective way to communicate with my body about the things that it wants and the things that are good for it… I think being aware of how my body is actually telling me things.… because, if your body needs things, it will ask you for them. So, maybe one day it’s cooking and the next day it’s a walk on the beach. If I can learn to check in with myself on an intuitive level which is something that I’m working with now, being more aware of what I want and why I want it, then I can say, “Oh, okay. Well, that’s exactly what I need.” [Zena] Similarly, Kalli’s described the ongoing process of connecting with her body. I do yoga, but it’s very focused and stuff and I love that. So that’s one element of feeling very in-tune with your body, because you’re moving and you’re breathing and you’re taking that time to connect… the beauty of yoga, if people practice it
137 the way it was meant to be practiced, it gets better with age. You become more in tune with your body. [Kalli] Consciously relating to themselves also entailed attentiveness to the impact activities had on women’s well-being. For example, Nimco commented on the impact of soccer on her stress level, “It just keeps me going. Yeah, it keeps me from tipping over to say, “I’m really stressed.” Gemma commented on the impact of activities on her mental health. “What’s going to make me happy? I spend a lot of time on my own mental health over the years and I am very aware of what is going to make me happy.”
Women also created space whereby their capacity to respond to biological needs was prioritized, such as the need for food or rest. I’m not going to do anything right now, I’m just going to drift off and let my body decide if it wants to sleep or not. ’Cause you can’t force a nap. I’d like to say, “sleep now,” and you can’t do that. But if you let your body nap when it wants to, then it’s going to. [Tali] Conscious awareness of the body also involved choosing rituals around self-care and relaxation. It’s not only putting myself to sleep necessarily, and the care and the things that I do before bed, like brush my teeth, wash my face, put some lotion on, whatever, it’s actually putting my body to bed. So I would know where I’m feeling uncomfortable. Some days I walk a lot and my feet are sore. Other days I’m premenstrual and my back is aching. So just to be able to have that quiet moment and to kind of be in my body makes me feel good, makes me feel happy… I think I experience my body as well when I’m resting and it’s a joyful thing to just kind of have not only a bed and comfy covers and a nice pillow and everything, but to have my body to kind of be inside of. I really like that and it makes me happy. [Radha]
138 A key element of Reading the Body was having a keen sense of body ownership and autonomy. For some women, consciously relating to their body occurred particularly when engaged in strenuous physical activities. The women described consciously focusing on the way they felt when engaged in physical activities, rather than on how they or others perceived their appearance. Ophelia describe her sexual orientation as queer and her socioeconomic status as working class. Dancing is a very freeing activity, I would say, in that it’s one of those moments where I stop worrying what are people thinking of me, what—how do I look. I stop because I feel the music and don’t care anymore. And that’s really joyful is to not care.… It also makes me feel powerful… Recognizing that dancing actually really does feel really good and knowing it. Instead of subconsciously, but being really conscious of it. [Ophelia] At times, relating to oneself was highly conscious. Ostara has a genetic health condition that led to some alteration of appearance as well as perceptual difficulties. Wow, I am alive, and I am acknowledging that I am alive. And then I will just go through, and start looking at all of the parts of my body and I am just like, wow! It’s almost like a very conscious relating thing… I spent a lot of time at home and painting. I just got naked, it was August and it was in the summer. So I got naked and I closed all the blinds and just put on some music and I would just like dance around the floor and just experiencing dancing and turning and twisting and it was all very much about how I could make the shadow, the most kind of flowy curves as much as possible. I was watching my shadow and trying to make everything very much like that and then kind of painting when I felt like that. It just felt good to move with my body. It just felt really great to dance and twist and move around. [Ostara] However, at other times this consciousness occurred during quiet pursuits, such as meditation.
139 Another way that I did learn as a young person about my body was just through breath… just being in the meditative aspect of focusing and being still… You do have a heightened sense of yourself and you do notice mentally what’s going on around you, at the minute scale where you might be able to hear a clock ticking or something like that, but you do notice how your body feels and how good it feels to be in your body, in my case. [Radha] In the focus group, women noted the importance of developing a conscious relationship with their bodies. Kalli: It is your body. I just sort of follow my gut and then I see what makes me happy and what doesn’t and that’s just how I live my life. Gemma: But an instinct requires building. Kalli: Yes, it is work. It totally is work. Gemma: But instinct comes from somewhere and it comes from your experience and that’s it. And you don’t get to that without the experience so I'll do things purely for experience… Women noted the importance of this conscious relationship in guiding their decisions, as Jade noted, “trusting your gut and trusting your instincts over that sense of what’s out there in the culture and society that’s telling me what to do.” Participants mentioned continuing to attend to their bodies when interacting with others as well, for example when engaged in physical activity with other people. As Ostara noted, “If we are going hiking, she’s like, ‘oh, you’ve got to hike faster,’ and I am like, ‘nope, I am going at my pace. We’re snowshoeing and I want to sit at this river for a bit.’” Women also met their own needs rather than waiting for other people to meet them. Krishna identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual and has always been single. I love soccer… but I never really had time to play ’cause it was basically me and my sister and everybody else was working. So that I felt was an impediment, I
140 was like soccer’s a group sport so we have to play in a group. But there was no group. So I never really played soccer. And this year I was like you know what? It doesn’t matter. If no one’s gonna be there, I’ll just go out and kick the ball around myself. [Krishna] 4.2.2. Personal Meaning. The joyful body experiences that women chose were often imbued with a sense of personal meaning and reflected their understanding of their own identity. For example, Gemma is widowed and many of her joyful body experiences connected her to her deceased husband. My husband was a pilot and we had our own airplane so a lot of the things that we did together were flying related… I have the helmet, the leather helmet with the buckles because those were his and so I inherited those and I use those for biplanes… I’m very, very connected with him… That early aviation, the pioneering aviation is the era that he was interested in and I got hooked because it’s that whole idea of taking a risk, getting in a plane. You don’t know if you are going to survive but you’re on a mission… After he died I found myself always— that’s how I got through everything. I’ve got a mission, I need to complete this mission… They’re very simple things like on his birthday I’m going to fly. [Gemma] Gemma expanded on an element of the meaning behind her missions during the focus group discussion and noted, “who knows when it’s going to be my last birthday. I don’t take it for granted that I'm going to see another birthday. My husband died at the same age I am now.” Women often identified joyful body experiences as being related to their own identity and as an essential element of their self-definition or redefinition. It’s more about having pleasurable experiences where you’re building a skill… I’m choosing to define myself by my abilities, so I think that’s where I’m different from other people. I’ve always wanted to do things opposed to look a certain way.… It’s about defining who you are. Are you going to define yourself
141 simply by what other people see you as, or are you going to define yourself and choose to define yourself by your abilities. [Kalli] Jade described in a poignant way the connection between her sense of identity as an Indigenous woman and her experience of feeling grounded and joyful in her body. That was again that sensation of feeling at home and I don’t know where that comes from. I know when I was older, when I got to university, I was able to make a little bit more sense of it. In the Native community we talk about this process of going home, which is a very loaded concept. For some people it means physically going back to your reserve. For some people it might be learning about culture, some people it might be learning about language… It might be about rectifying family relationships. It might be about just getting out of the city for a little while and going and spending some time in the bush. It’s so many different things, this process of going home that we talk about, that I felt like I started to understand a bit more about what it was to be a Native woman and how that worked. And so starting to understand, starting to have the vocabulary to talk about gender roles and saying, “oh, my mom and most of my family didn’t fit to a particular gender role…” The way that I feel about my body and about me being a woman, I can now label as Indigenous feminism. But how could I have known that when I was in Grade 3, right? So logically it doesn’t make sense, but illogically that’s what it feels like… when I had those really joyful experiences, it just felt right. And so I didn’t question it, I didn’t attach the filter, the guilt. [Jade] For several women, the connection between meaning, identity, and engagement in joyful activities was relevant to the domain of work. I think if we’re going to be working for many years of our lives, I want something to show for it. I want to come to—not necessarily the end of it, I don’t know when I’m ever going to stop taking pictures, but I want to build a body of work that I can be proud of. It’s not just good for business, I think it’s just really important because I’m taking pictures of them, it’s something they’re going to be holding on to for years. [Gemma]
142 Zena reflected on a change in her sense of personal meaning and identity. I look at my life as being like a big knot or a big wheel and everything is generally coming, has come, to the centre and I’ve got all the things that I need. I’ve got all the things that I want and I can change my life in any kind of intentional way that I want to. I can say for the rest of my life to come these are the things that I want and, for the first time, I’m not scared. [Zena] 4.2.3. Choice. Most women stated that incorporating joyful body experiences into their lives involved making a choice to do so. Indeed, women were actively engaged in seeking out joyful activities and creating spaces for joyful activities in their lives. Several women noted the ways in which they made constant choices regarding decisions that benefit their well-being. Zena reported having several chronic health conditions. I’ve made a choice about everything that goes in my ears. There are things that I will hear and there are things that I will disregard because they don’t apply to me because this person is, for whatever reason, not aligned with my beliefs and that’s okay. I will make a decision about the things that I see… I’ll make a decision about the things that go into my body. And it was through basically a process of repossessing my body, of taking control of it and saying this is mine. [Zena] During the focus group discussion Gemma noted that valuing joyful body activities led to choosing to engage in those activities. It’s a lot of little steps. It’s never one thing. It’s always going to be something that you do over time because you think it’s important and that’s it. If you don’t think it’s important, you’re never going to be invested in it and you're never going to put in the effort that it takes to get where you want to go.
143 Several women spoke about ceasing to engage in some joyful body activities, feeling the loss of those activities and, as a result, choosing to return to them. Nimco identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual; she is married to a man and has children. Having a passion for things that you like to do or that make you feel good about yourself and if I stop playing soccer, I find for me it’s like, oh, well I can’t just do work and home. It’s not me. I need something else to do. You’ve just got to find what works for you and for example, I didn’t play soccer for a little bit and then I got back into it. There was a year when I was really busy at work when I couldn’t play. I definitely missed it and I found ways to get back into it…I think it’s just finding whatever you enjoy because you don’t have a lot of time when you are a parent, it’s not your life anymore, but if you can find something you enjoy and find the time to do it, it’s great. [Nimco] Several women consciously recognized the positive impact that choosing to engage in joyful activities had on their outlook on life, even during times of distress. Now that I know I have a choice, there are times when I can be in pain and I know I don’t have to panic… you have an opportunity to take care of your body right now which is going to make you feel really good and, possibly, it’s going to make your day better. [Zena] This concludes the results regarding the second theme of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy, namely, Internal Environments. This theme included the sub-themes of Reading the Body, Personal Meaning, and Choice.
4.3. Social Relationships The third theme of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy is Social Relationships. Almost all participants noted that a key element of their capacity to engage in joyful body activities related to their connection with other people. At times, other people were directly involved in their joyful body experiences, for example, during sexual activities, walking, and
144 swimming. Relationships created, nurtured, or reinforced spaces whereby it was considered acceptable or essential for women to respond to their own needs and to engage in joyful body activities. The Social Relationships theme includes the sub-themes Supportive Relationships and Role Models (see Figure 8 for the delineation of sub-themes within the theme of Social Relationships).
Figure 8. Sub-themes within the theme of Social Relationships.
Social Relationships
Supportive Relationships
Role Models
4.3.1. Supportive Relationships. An essential element of Social Relationships involved engaging in relationships that support joyful activities. The women were not immersed in supportive relationships or environments all of the time and some of the women had spaces in their lives that were neutral, not particularly supportive, or unsupportive. However, women surrounded themselves with friends and family members who encouraged their engagement in joyful body activities. As Kalli noted during the focus group, “we’ve surrounded ourselves amongst other people that are supportive of our interests and aren’t judging us. They’re supporting and so we’re growing with our interest.” At times, these women celebrated deep connection with others through joint engagement in joyful activities. It’s this really intense song and we all got in partners and we had to design a dance, with our partner, and I was with my friend and she is Black and I am
145 White and we always kind of played off that… you were supposed to enact evil and good at the same time so we developed this dance with each other where it was very much like pushing and pulling and bending over each other and twisting and moving. There was something about that dance that I also felt very strong and vivid, and it wasn’t even a very long dance but it was before and afterwards doing it. I remember being on stage and our hair kind of moving everywhere and our body parts moving everywhere and just feeling so engaged and also part of the whole sensual movement of the body moving in this very strong and empowered way and just feeling very connected with her. We were in this very understanding kind of dynamic with each other. Afterwards when we were walking down the hill from the high school where it was being performed and the sun was going down and just feeling almost like the way I would idealize an Amazon woman, just being able to tromp anywhere and do anything. [Ostara] Supportive social environments included groups where women could pursue their joyful activities with other like-minded people. Zena identified her sexual orientation as homosexual; she is married to a female partner. We had this whole section of the course where we talked about girl motifs and girl stories and the things that kind of came up in all of our lives and we ended up with a list that was very, very similar. And a topic, even if we just chose one, we could all write a story about that, because we had all experienced shaving for the first time. We had all experienced someone making us feel dirty for the first time. Very, very common experiences and if suddenly you were in a room with five, 10 other people that have all done that, it is easy to say, [deep sigh] “That was normal and how many other women have gone through this?” Women’s spaces, women’s groups is a different kind of space that is held. It’s safer. It’s more consciously supportive for people that have the same types of experience. It was the same thing when I went to do a queer memoir group. It was all women as well. It was women that needed a space to be able to allow for their gayness and allow for those particular experiences and write them and let other people hear them. [Zena]
146 Several women valued the support of other women who engaged in activities that deemphasized appearance. Again, this support did not occur in an overtly political, critical, or resistive manner, however, it was experienced as helpful. Pamelia identified her ethnocultural heritage as White. The friends I had in university were pretty similar to me and how I thought about what I wore or how I looked… I remember in residence there was somehow, I think probably just by luck, because I don’t think they can tell this by applications, but the floors were really separated, and the floor below us was really, all the girls on that floor wore high heels all the time and spent a lot of time doing their hair and all wore lots of makeup, would wear really fancy clothes and go to fancy clubs, and all that stuff. And then the floor I was on was a lot more people who liked camping and didn’t care if they didn’t wash their hair for a few days, and all that kind of thing. So I made good friends with those people and we didn’t worry that much about it. [Pamelia] Several women mentioned the importance of friendship groups whereby dieting was not the norm. In Krishna’s friendship group, “my friends—they were all different body shapes and stuff. So we all like eating… it never really mattered to us how we looked. As long as we had a great time, we’re good.” Most of the women who were in partnering relationships at the time of the interview commented on the importance of their romantic partners in supporting engagement in joyful activities. Radha identified her sexual orientation as heterosexual and slightly bi, and at the time of the interview she was in a long-term relationship with a man. The first time I came back from abroad, I hadn’t seen a mirror in weeks… and the clothes that I had were not the cleanest, it was ridiculous. I looked like a frizzy hippy or a street performer with funky type clothing. And I came home… And my partner is like, “You look so great. Hey, baby, come here…” he was so happy and he was just, “You look amazing.” In general my romantic relationships on my body, impact really positively. [Radha]
147 Women’s access to joyful activities with family members was also important. Pamelia described her family as being economically comfortable. A few weeks ago, my sister and I were up at my grandma’s house on the lake… my sister and I often will swim, just slowly swim. Sort of like going for a walk but swimming, and just go around the shore, and just talk and swim and come back and then we went to a floating dock and just jumped and played for a while and swam back. If my brothers are around, we’ll all swim together too… Having a really supportive, stable, love-filled upbringing, which was really good, both my family and I had a really good school, I had good teachers, good friends, all that kind of thing, which is amazing. And I realize the older I get how special it is. When you’re a kid you don’t realize of course, it’s just normal, but now I realize how important that was. [Pamelia] Regarding their sexuality, two participants described their experiences of coming out as queer or homosexual and the ways in which supportive social environments allowed them to honour their sexual orientation. I had a good friend at the time really supporting me saying, “you have to do this, you don’t want to wake up when you’re 50 and say, ‘Where did my sense of entitlement with my own body go? Where did my sense of freedom go?’” I needed to go through that because I had such a strong impulse to hide that, and to not let anyone see that and think no one could ever possibly understand. Even though, when you come out, you realize somehow that you’re standing in a crowd of people that have all walked out of the closet at the exact same time and you’re looking around going “oh!” [Zena] 4.3.2. Role Models. Most of the women referred to the positive impact of an influential role model in their lives, particularly a role model who increased their capacity for self-acceptance and encouraged their experience of joy. Women expressed agency in attending particularly to those role models who encouraged them. Many women have parents who are or were strong role models. In many
148 cases role modelling began when the women were children. Mothers often modelled healthy behaviour in addition to encouraging and supporting their daughters. My mom always pushed us to be healthy. And she communicated that through, “hey, would you be interested in joining gymnastics class or would you rather do something else? What are you interested in?” And even though we couldn’t afford it, [laughing] she wanted to see us being active basically, which was really cool. So I joined a soccer team and I used to do gymnastics and that kind of stuff when we could afford it. And when we couldn’t, she really—she babysat a lot, so she let us loose… knowing that being healthy was important to be. We can’t sit in front of the TV all day… we would go clothes shopping and I would cry because I wouldn’t find anything. And she’s like, “it’s not you that’s the problem.” It’s framing it that way. [Ophelia] Other mothers’ role-modelled healthy food choices. My mother wasn’t into calorie counting. She was just into eating healthy things. So her influence was buying good food. She would buy lots of vegetables and fruits that are organic and lots of juices and things that had different nutrients in them. [Ostara] Many mothers were unconditionally loving and supportive. Pamelia described her family as economically comfortable. My mom would tell all of us that we were beautiful when we were kids, which was nice… you always feel good when someone tells you that. And my mom was always great, she always gave us hugs and we were pretty physical as a family, hugging all the time and tickle fights and all that kind of stuff, which was fun. So I think that added to a comfort level… just having a kind of practical disposition, realizing that it’s not that important to look amazing. [Pamelia]
149 Women shared that their mothers were particularly key role models around demonstrating women’s capacities to meet challenges while also interacting with the world. Jade identified her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous; she was raised by her non-Native single mother. My mom was an awesome role model… I mean, she was strong as an ox, so if it was about lifting heavy things she could do it… She never encouraged me to lose weight, she never encouraged me to do those things… she had been down that road and she didn’t want to see me go through that… just being around her and seeing how comfortable she was with her body, especially with a disability… I was just like, “you’re amazing”… not having to unlearn stereotypes of fat people… I feel like I’m very lucky, and for that reason I was able to build my own self up in a different way then most people… that allowed me to have that conception that like, oh, women like my mom and women like these Indigenous women are different and they’re strong and they're all these things that women aren’t supposed to be. [Jade] Often women’s mothers did not focus on the body as a primary concern. Nimco and her family emmigrated from East Africa to Canada when she was a child. She has never said, “oh I’m too fat,” or, “I can’t eat this.” I would say she is comfortable in her own skin… I didn’t know any other way besides her being who she was and comfortable… I have a very similar personality to my mother, too. [Nimco] Relatives at times also presented alternate options regarding what was appropriate and necessary for women to be interested in, in contrast to image based concerns. My granddad was really supportive and we would talk a lot… he would tell me about finance and interest rates… I think he just wanted to make sure that I knew what a stock was and how banks worked… which was a good foundation I realize now [laughter]. [Pamelia]
150 Role models also encouraged women to focus on interests and ideas rather than on appearance. Radha’s parents both emmigrated from South Asian to Canada before she was born. The body was not the primary focus. So being a certain size or looking a certain way was never the focus. I was always told that there’s nothing I couldn’t do and interests and ideas and thoughts were explored… always supported, explored and pursued either with me or they were like oh, she wants to do ballet, we’ll put her in ballet. Okay, she’s a little bit too boisterous for ballet; let’s put her in Highland dancing…Oh, she wants to tumble around a lot, let’s try doing that. So there were lots of things that I was encouraged by my parents to do and explore and they were always there for me to do those things, to help me do those things. And my parents… how they look is not their focus. It’s very much about doing and being, and exploring life in ways, or supporting one another, or asking questions, so those types of things. So it was very nurturing that way. [Radha] Several women who had been active all of their lives noted the importance of activity as a norm within their families. Having that sort of comfort level, everyone is comfortable riding a bike and walking for a few kilometres and doing all that stuff, it’s not new to any of us, so I think that helps a lot. We can do all those things together and it’s fun. [Pamelia] Women noted the importance of older female relatives, such as aunts or sisters, as role models for their joyful body activities when they were young woman. I come from a large family and I have a lot of sisters. I have a few other sisters who are into sports and who played a lot. I think watching them and they were comfortable with themselves to wear shorts and things like that… once I was in that environment and I saw other people, role models, it was easier for me not to, if all my sisters were all conscientious about their bodies, maybe I might have had a—or not, [laughter] but it might have had a different influence. Quite a few of them are comfortable with how they were and they were active. [Nimco]
151 Women noted relatives who role-modelled positive feelings about themselves and their appearance. I also have older cousins who are like older sisters, so that also helped as well to have different ideas… I had good role models with all the women in my family about you should… feel good about how you look. [Radha] For some women, role models provided a model of how to engage with themselves All those inner critics that you have, if you can just give yourself a moment to let those inner critics be silenced when there’s something, I think you have to have something to replace those expectations with. I want to replace my critic with my yoga teacher [laughter]. And it is much easier. You see something else to listen to and you can’t, I think, unless you have a place to jump to, you're not going to jump from where you are. [Zena] For some women, particularly women who identified as fat, role models of other fat women were particularly important to them with regards to self-acceptance. Ophelia stated, “My aunt… She’s a big woman and she’s just, so so happy of who she is and bold. She’s a bold woman and so inspiring. I think that probably had a lot to do with it.” Or, as Tali described: My aunt is a professional ballroom dancer and she owns a dance studio and she’s fat. She’s an amazing dancer and… it was kind of a visual reminder of wow, she’s a dance teacher. That makes her an athlete, that makes her a really physical and fit person. And she’s super pear-shaped and fat and that is just not a contradiction. So that was cool. I… see her as an inspiration. This concludes the results regarding the third theme of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy, namely, Social Relationships. This theme included the sub-themes of Supportive Relationships and Role Models.
152 Summary This chapter described themes that were the basis of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy. The results suggested that creating environments that nurtured joy involved an active process whereby women decided to create and participate in environments that enabled and facilitated their engagement in joyful body activities. Women created and engaged with spaces that were safe, often by protecting themselves. Women valued and practiced joyful body activities by integrating activities into their daily lives. They engaged in their joyful body experiences on a regular and consistent basis, and decided to participate in joyful body activities that occurred in the natural world. Women chose to create environments that nurtured joy through connecting the women to their inner world, where women were conscious in the manner that they related to themselves and their bodies. Women focused on the importance of identity and personal meaning in guiding their activities and chose to engage in activities that they experienced as joyful. A vital element of creating spaces of joy was women’s access to, and engagement with, socially supportive environments and their valuing of role models who helped to guide their engagement in joyful activities.
Chapter Five - Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze is the third of four core categories that emerged in the analysis of participants’ narratives about their experiences of joy in their bodies. Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle is divided into two interrelated chapters. The current chapter, entitled Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, is focused on women negotiating the judgment of other people (whether individuals or the broader society), and negotiating the expectation that women engage in selfcritical body striving or diet and food preoccupation. The women in this study sought to reject these expectations and instead attended to joy. The following chapter, Chapter 6, entitled Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy, is focused on women’s journey to embracing themselves and their bodies in order to find a place where joy was enabled. Many of the women in this study, at some point in their lives, experienced struggles to engage with themselves and their bodies in joyful ways given the social contexts in which they lived. Participants’ experiences of joy were often framed as acts of resistance against the expectation that their relationship with their bodies be fraught with conflict and that they be focused on altering their bodies to fit expectations regarding femininity within their cultural contexts. These women’s struggles reflected their desire and capacity to hold on to their joy within the context of an oppressive and appearance-based culture that constantly worked to disrupt their joyful body experiences, and their refusal to allow their experiences of joy to be contingent on their appearance or other’s judgment of them. The women in this study were able to curtail and limit the impact of others’ external gaze through a variety of strategies in order to re-focus on their own pleasure. Ultimately, women were able to connect with joy through rejecting all forms of external gaze by retaking agency through their own competency and self153
154 focus. A discussion of the joyful experience of women in this study would be incomplete and idealized without acknowledgement of their resistance, struggles, and the barriers and judgments they navigated in attaining joy. Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze is comprised of four primary themes: Media Deconstruction, Disengagement from Problematic Relationships, Personal Practices, and Critical Political Consciousness (see Figure 9 for the delineation of themes under the dimension of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze). Figure 9. Primary Themes within the core dimension of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze.
Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze Media Deconstruction
Disengagement from Problematic Relationships
Personal Practices Critical Political Consciousness
5.1. Media Deconstruction The women in this study were highly critical of the media; they framed their critiques as acts of resistance, and the media as a form of external gaze that impinged upon their experience of acceptance of their bodies and of joy. All of the women stated that the images presented in the media involved an appearance focus that they believed was constraining and damaging and they spoke at length about the ways in which they interacted with mainstream media and culture, including television and fashion magazines, in order to mitigate the negative impact of the media
155 on themselves. Media Deconstruction includes a focus on media literacy, rejection of media, and accessing and creating alternate forms of media. Women’s critiques of the media were often focused on deconstruction of harmful media messages. Jade, who described her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous, stated that many people “just do something easy and look at magazines. Because that’s safe. Let’s just do video games, ’cause that’s safe. Let’s just go watch TV. But meanwhile, these are the most harmful things.” Media literacy related to awareness that media depictions of women were air brushed images, rather than authentic representations of women. It’s fun to deconstruct magazine images… you can be a fan of the magazine and still rip apart the models for their airbrushing and pretend, let’s pretend Barbie’s a real human being and see all the problems that she would have. That’s extremely cathartic, ’cause these are symbols of things that we’re supposed to be and so to smash them down with logic is really satisfying. [Jade] All of the women in this study noted that they rejected media representations of an ideal body and related media messages regarding age, beauty, health and wellness activities, and romantic relationships. In the focus group, women addressed their perception of media. I think watching too much TV, you start getting a sense of what is considered normal… you start exposing yourself more and more. At some point you might think that’s actually normal the way they look.… who’s getting all the attention? Who are the female role models that are considered successful? They have certain archetype… beautiful women that have money and kids and the whole shebang which is very difficult for most women to obtain… but those are the ones that media idolizes and so they’re the ones that this is what women should be aspiring to. [Kalli] All women strongly rejected the media’s focus on image and appearance and identified their own alternate focus on issues in their lives that the media sensationalized or did not address,
156 such as the value of community, environmentalism, feminism, and science. Judy described her decision to eliminate television viewing from her life, “No TV. [laughter] I think that kind of goes hand in hand with my personal development as well and just being more aware politically.” Many women commented that the media present women’s bodies and appearance as never being good enough. Nothing is good enough. Your lashes can be longer, your eyes can be bigger, your lips could be fuller, your breasts could be perkier, your legs could be thinner, you could be longer, nothing is perfect. Every little thing is wrong with women… they’re made to feel inadequate so that they buy more things. There’s some sort of standard that really is not realistic for most people. [Kalli] The women’s descriptions of false claims by the media extended to claims regarding the effectiveness of products advertised in the media; this knowledge enabled them to reject those false claims. I think also being in science I’ve learned how little a lot of that stuff does, they can claim anything… there’s very little regulation… If a cosmetic wants to say, “this will make you look younger,” they can say that. Even if it’s water that you spray on your face, even if it’s just moisturizer, they don’t have to have a study to back that up. They don’t have to show that there’s actually anything in it… knowing that, it lets me be a little bit more practical when I see those advertisements. [Pamelia] Many women noted that the media was irrelevant to them; it did not fit their values and they found it uninteresting, as Jade stated: “It’s irrelevant, it’s totally irrelevant. It’s celebrity gossip… Why am I gonna waste my time on this?” Additionally, media images did not represent the construct of beauty the women aspired to. Rejecting this construct enabled women to embrace their bodies and to engage with their bodies joyfully, without that joy being contingent on meeting external expectations. Ophelia
157 stated, “it doesn't appeal to me. I don’t listen basically [laughter]. I don't believe them… That their body type is better than my body type. Your message does not make sense to me. Love your body makes sense to me.” Women stated their appreciation of a variety of types of beauty, and defined beauty as encompassing a variety of body types, skin colours and personality types, rather than the limited and constraining images presented by the media. Several of the women noted that their experiences in hospitals and working with women with disabilities had shifted their understanding of what is attractive relative to media messages, including Nimco, who immigrated from East Africa as a child and stated, “I am more of a critic… so I have seen different things… from a critical eye, that that isn’t necessarily the beauty I aspire to.” The women did not desire to focus intently on their appearance to the exclusion of other elements of themselves, and, in this study, women of all body sizes and ethnic backgrounds rejected the media presentation of a narrow range of possible types of attractiveness. Several women of colour noted that they observed very few images of women with similar skin tones to themselves in mainstream media, while others noted that they did not observe any women of similar background to themselves; Radha, who described herself as being of South Asian heritage, stated, “I didn’t see images of people who looked like me. There were no South Asian images.” All of the women noted that media images were unrepresentative of their bodies to such an extent that they realized they could not fit the narrow media mould and decided not to compare themselves to these images at all. This occurred with women of all sizes and shapes in this study, from thin to larger; all believed they could not fit media ideals regarding body size, including Jade who described herself as a short, chubby, Indigenous woman. I was always really frustrated ’cause when do you see like short, chubby models? Never. So it was very clear to me that I was not represented, not to mention short chubby Native women, right? It was very clear to me that I wasn’t represented there. I could never afford the items in there, it was such unrealistic expectations
158 that I knew I couldn’t fit. Not to say I wasn’t impacted by that, but that very much recognizing that I just couldn’t fit that ideal and so I wouldn’t try. [Jade] In order to reduce the constraining impact of media messages, almost all participants limited their exposure to what they described as the most harmful forms of media, namely television and magazines. Typically this involved not owning a television, not having cable, and not purchasing fashion magazines. The few women who did engage in television watching noted that they were extremely selective regarding the programming they chose to watch. Women sought connections with other people who also did not engage with mainstream media, as Ostara stated, “I don’t watch TV. I don’t read magazines. I live with people who don’t do either of those things. I never watch movies, for the past three years. I just don’t see it essentially.” Even while being highly critical of media messaging and rejecting those messages, several women stated that avoidance and critique of media messages was a struggle given that media is present in public spaces and is unavoidable. Even limited exposure to media resulted in several women questioning whether they should begin to engage in beauty practices more frequently. However, they were able to reject this pressure, with continual reminders to themselves regarding the irrelevance of these expectations in their own lives. I just remind myself that it’s not real. I know that magazine pictures are air brushed … and partly remind myself that it’s not what’s important to me. That I know that if I have a bit of extra fat on my thighs or around my stomach, I don’t really care… the ads for, you should use these creams so you don’t look so tired, you should use this spray so your hair looks fresher, or whatever. That’s the kind of thing that I’ll see and think maybe I should try that cream for my eyes because I do look a little bit tired. Maybe I should try this. And usually I think I don’t want to wind up with a bathroom full of, a cabinet full of all this stuff, because I probably won’t use it all the time. And I think I would like to not look so tired, I would like to have really clear skin, or look better in whatever way that they’re saying I should look, but I have to sort of remind myself, no, it probably doesn’t
159 work. But it’s hard to do, they’re so convincing, especially in the subway, I think mostly because those are the ads that I see more than others because I don’t read magazines a whole lot, but it just sort of gives you this idea of yeah, I do need to do that. But, yeah, I don’t really. [Pamelia] At times, media messages continued to impinge upon the women, for example, Krishna, who described her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian Canadian, mentioned her reluctance to begin running. “I didn’t really feel comfortable. I always looked at myself, I’m not super-toned like all those people that you see on magazine covers or athletic sports covers.” However, rejecting these messages freed women to engage in joyful activities on their own terms. If you pick up a yoga journal, magazine, wanting to look like that person is very not yoga like. So it’s the same thing as looking at a fashion magazine and saying, “I want to be like that person.” Unfortunately, there is a lot of that as well, so, I think it has to be a very spiritual connection with the physical practice to really become a little bit more at ease with yourself. [Kalli] Several women stated their belief that all mainstream media should be eliminated. Ophelia, who described herself as a queer, working class woman, stated: “End mass media. Kill Cosmo.” However, others proposed that shifts in current media depictions of women would be sufficient for change to occur. Kalli, who identified her ethnocultural heritage as CanadianAsian, noted that, “if women of all types, shapes, sizes, careers, were portrayed as just being very happy and, if they were happy obviously, then that would actually send a message.” Several women spoke about the importance of accessing alternative forms of media. For example, women who read magazines did not typically read fashion magazines, but focused on cultural magazines that addressed issues such as the natural world and the economy. Similarly, several women watched television shows on a public broadcaster on topics such as art or news. Progressive blogs were a common source of information and connection, and several women
160 noted the importance of feminist media and body positive media. Other women accessed media from their home cultures, for example South Asian media or Native media, stating that those sources were less focused on idealized images and more focused on news and critical discussion. Jade identified her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous. Now I’m finding some really positive spaces online. And understanding what’s feminist media… There’s alternative media and I should probably make an effort to educate myself… It’s been a realization. All these places that I found that this is more reflective of me and this is something I can identify with… I found all these Native newspapers. There’s a whole bunch of them and they’re actually really good and they report on all kinds of things—politics, science, current events, whatever the case may be. But it’s written by and for Native people. That’s pretty cool. [Jade] However, access to their home culture’s media did not necessarily imply that that material was unproblematic. Regarding her South Asian community within Canada, Radha stated, “I saw things that I didn’t like within the South Asian community about the roles of men and women… too chauvinistic or had misogynistic attitudes toward women.” Several women have also created alternative forms of media, particularly zines and blogs that were critical of mainstream media’s focus and that addressed issues that were more relevant to the women (zines are self-created and self-published mini-magazines devoted to specialized subject matter, with a small circulation whereby profit is not the primary intent. Blogs are web logs, websites where an individual or a group of users post content, often in the form of personal journal-style reflections). Indeed, engagement in creation of these alternative media materials was often framed as a joyful activity in and of itself, while also re-enforcing women’s resistance to mainstream gazes and pressures. The social connection imbued in these projects was essential and is further addressed subsequently in the current chapter.
161 In my first full year or so of fat acceptance, I was blogging pretty intensely about my experience with it and just kind of like getting my thoughts out on paper. Well, the screen. And I think that helped because obviously I could have journaled on paper but I did end up getting a couple of readers and we exchanged ideas. So just the idea that I was saying things other people were agreeing with was really helping in having some affirmation that way. It was building a community when I didn’t have a physical one. [Tali] The several women who were involved in media creation were cognizant of the impact of their work. Gemma is a photographer who utilizes Photoshop as an aspect of her job. I work a lot with photography and image so we are bombarded with images. I look at magazines, I can’t look at a magazine the same way because I know it’s been Photoshopped. I do editing myself and so there’s a lot of judgment that goes into editing about what you leave in, what you take out and what you change. I change very little. I don’t change anything that’s a permanent part of people’s faces. I think there’s a lot of diversity out there and we should celebrate it… I don’t want people to look the same, I want people to look different… You can feel good about yourself without looking like other people. Just to be yourself. [Gemma] This concludes the results regarding the first theme of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, namely, Media Deconstruction. 5.2. Disengagement from Problematic Relationships In the present study, women’s resistance to external body judgment and pressure to diet was intertwined with their experiences of joy and body acceptance. The theme entitled Disengagement from Problematic Relationships describes women coping with and responding to the external gaze of harsh and critical family members, friends, and co-workers in order to reject these critiques of their bodies, and, instead, focus their attention on self-acceptance and
162 connecting with joy. Disengagement from Problematic Relationships contains the sub-themes Parental Judgment, and Others' Diet Talk (see Figure 10 for the delineation of sub-themes within the theme of Disengagement from Problematic Relationships). Figure 10. Sub-themes within the theme of Disengagement from Problematic Relationships.
Disengagement from Problematic Relationships
Parental Judgment
Others’ Diet Talk
5.2.1. Parental Judgment. Many participants struggled with past or present experiences of parental judgment, restriction, and criticism of the women’s physical activity, bodies, and weight. This experience of an external gaze within intimate relationships had an impact in shaping the women’s experience within their bodies, and ultimately, all of the women who experienced parental judgment rejected this external gaze in order to connect with their own bodies and focus on joy. Ophelia’s parents divorced when she was a child, and as a child and youth she lived with her mother in a working class and economically disadvantaged household. My father always not being okay with my weight… So I was getting letters from my dad that were saying, “you’re too fat.” As a kid, being like “what? What is he talking about?” Really being confused more than anything. Definitely feeling bad about that at the time but mostly being confused, “why is someone that I love saying these things?” … always felt in the end unsafe. Always feeling that I was being pushed to do or be something that I am not… Always in the background being asked what kind of exercise are you doing, and being sent diet books as a
163 kid, as 13 years old and 14, and getting the South Beach Diet, the G.I. Diet, the this, the that. Totally unacceptable. [Ophelia] These parental judgments were often explicitly gender based. Judy, whose parents immigrated to Canada from Asia, was unable to engage in her joyful experience of martial arts until she left her family home. “I’ve always wanted to learn martial arts and in my immediate family I was never really permitted to do so because I was a woman. A very chauvinistic kind of environment growing up.” At times, women described the imposition of parental concerns over the women’s bodies as directly critical and inappropriate. Several women eliminated parents from their lives as a strategy to reject this negative parental judgement and messaging. This included Gemma, who described herself as heavy, within healthy range. All the messages were very negative. I don’t remember a single positive message… My mother, she is smaller than I am. She’s very petite and her idea about being a woman is completely different than mine. Night and day… I hadn’t spoken to my mother in five years… I decided my mother is not a role model for me… If my mother had her choice I wouldn’t look like I do right now and I wouldn’t behave the way I do right now. [Gemma] In the focus group, Gemma described similar harsh attitudes that she encountered at a family reunion. “One person hadn’t seen me since I was 10 and she said, “Oh, you’ve really gained a lot of weight and you’re a lot bigger now.” Regardless of parental intentions, interactions regarding the women’s bodies sometimes resulted in direct conflict as women voiced their resistance to this external gaze. I can remember having it be a scramble to find things that would fit me in a normal store. I can remember bawling in a dressing room when my mother was throwing more things and more things and more things over the door. I can remember sitting in the car on our way home and she said, “don’t worry. We’ll
164 get you to a gym. We’ll get you to a gym and we’ll fix this. It’s okay.” She’s a fixer. She’s said, “you’re unhappy. This is what we’re going to do,” and I can just remember screaming at her at the top of my lungs, “there’s nothing wrong with me. This is not what the problem is.” [Zena] These conflicts occurred primarily when women were adolescents. Ostara identified her family’s socioeconomic status as poor. My mother is a personal trainer and when she first started her own business when I was fifteen, she really insisted on training me as practice and I really resented it. I do not like being led and told how to do things so it actually caused a lot of conflict between us, because I would get really haughty with her when we were doing workouts. [Ostara] However, some parents continued to be critical of the women, even in adulthood. The women who experienced this were able to resist such critiques in order to maintain their focus on their own beliefs regarding their bodies, though they noted that responding to critiques was a frustrating struggle at times. I might wear a top that’s not flattering and she’s like, “I never realized you were so wide.” Just not tactful at all… the way she puts it, it sounds like it’s my body, but because I have a really comfortable relationship with my body I interpret it as the clothing. Because at the end of the day regardless if it’s my mom… I don’t let it get into my own self-value… because I am comfortable with myself. [Kalli] Comments made by women’s families had differing impacts on different children. Judy described her body type as thin and petite, while her sister was larger; “There was always this running joke in my family because I have a sister and they would always tell my sister, ‘stop stealing her food…’ those comments affected her just as much as they affected me.” For some of the women with financial resources, their higher socioeconomic class may have increased parental encouragement of dieting behaviour. Tali and Zena both had or have
165 parents who encouraged them to attempt to lose weight. While others, including Pamelia and Radha, had access to increased activity options through their families’ financial resources. Growing up quite privileged economically, there is definitely more pressure to be thin I think, the higher your economic class… also people have more time to devote to it. I mean my parents were willing to support me going to Weight Watchers and buying diet food and that sort of thing. And if I hadn’t been swimming, if I wanted to get a gym membership, they would have gotten me that. Even now, when I’m working, I can afford a gym membership. [Tali] Even for the women who had generally positive relationships with supportive parents, their parents at times have made negative judgments regarding the women’s activities. My dad could be a little bit critical… He would support all sports and activity and want all of us to be active, but he could also, because the things that I did, I didn’t play hockey or do something that’s a traditional sport, I danced and that was about it. And everything else that I did that was physical was just sort of fun, I would bike on the weekends, but that that was the only organized physical thing, and I don’t think he thought of that as exercise. So he would say things like, “You have to get some exercise.” “But I do, I take dance class.” “That doesn’t count.” I mean I didn’t care, I would ignore him. Mostly because, he would just sort of say that and nothing would happen, so it’s not like I had to worry about any kind of consequences. [Pamelia] Most parents appeared to have attempted to support their daughters in the best way that they could, knowing that society would be difficult for them if they were considered fat. However, regardless of parental intentions, women generally did not experience body-based negative parental commentary as positive or supportive, and indeed the women struggled with parental attitudes regarding the women’s own bodies. Zena was adopted and was not biologically linked to her father; however, their body types were similar.
166 Even though I wasn’t particularly overweight, my dad was looking at me, saying, “You are like me. You are someone who’s always going to struggle with their weight because it’s never going to be within that acceptable social norm.” I guess in a way he was saying, “There’s too much of you, just like there’s too much of me. Don’t worry.” But that wasn’t exactly as comforting as I think he meant it to be… He was more heavyset, bellied kind of guy and he said to me, “We will always have an issue with our weight. You’re like me. You’re like your grandmother,” and it didn’t matter that biologically that wasn’t true… there was definitely an idea that weight is something that is always going to be inherently a struggle. It’s always going to be something that you’re going to have to fight. It’s going to be very difficult. [Zena] Parents often presented a combination of both role modelling and challenges around the body. However, these women were ultimately able to find ways of expressing their values and their voice, even in the face of parental restrictions. My mom is always more about mastering the environment, like going really fast and seeing everything but she also likes experiencing nature but it is more about getting more done. Whereas I am like, “we can go a bit slower and see less things and be more aware of those less things.” [Ostara] Some of the women recognized that, at times, parental body-based commentary represented concerns regarding the parent’s own body. In response, the women created boundaries, including Radha, who described her ethnocultural heritage as South Asian, and described her body type as average and curvy. My mother at times has worried about my weight or commented on my weight.… And with my mom, it’s a little bit of that and then using my physicality as a gauge for her physicality sometimes. So I do try to put up a barrier in saying that this is where I’m at with health and physicality, and this is where you are, and those are separate things. [Radha]
167 When necessary, all women have clearly set boundaries with their parents around conversations that are judgemental of the women’s bodies. Regardless, these women experienced their parent’s judgement as painful and at times the rejection of this external gaze required effort and struggle on the women’s part, in order to re-focus on the women’s own beliefs. This applied to Tali, who described her ethnocultural heritage as White and Jewish and her parents’ socioeconomic status as upper middle class. I remember my mom saying, “You know, you'll look better if you stand up straight and suck in your tummy…” And then I remember her looking in the mirror and flapping her thighs and her belly and going, “oh man, I just really have to lose some weight.” And I looked at her and I thought that she was beautiful, she was my mom. And my mom has actually never been very fat. Right now, I’m much fatter than she has ever been. If you think you’re unacceptable, what in the world do you think of me? My parents are still cycling, dieting. It’s been 10 years since we did that and they will still do it. And so I’ve made it clear to them that my body’s not a topic of conversation that we’re going to talk about any more. And so they don’t. But I know they think about it and so every time I see them, I’m always like are they going to tell me how fat I look this time? And I just imagine they see me and then they’re going to go into another room and be like, “oh, wow. What has she done to herself?” [Tali] Women were sometimes able to shift disruptive patterns with their parents in order to engage in activities that attended to their own needs. Zena spoke about this change occurring in her family following the death of her father, at the same time that she was learning to cope with having a chronic illness. I was letting everybody else say, “These are the rules,” and then impose them on me. Even if it wasn’t meant in a malicious way.… I said no. That shit doesn’t fly here [laughter]. It was really hard especially because my mom was the only parent left and she and I were kind of butting heads at that point because we were trying to get used to what the reality of our family was. There was a point at the beach
168 where I was collecting wood for a campfire because we had a cottage nearby. She looked at me and she said, “You stop that now” … I was about to drop the wood and then… I looked at her and I said, “No. I am going to do this because I’m okay and this is my choice,” or something to that effect and she just kind of looked at me like I was an alien. [Zena] Other women re-developed their relationship with their parents as they recognized their own need for change in their relationships in order to sustain themselves in achieving resistance and joy in their bodies. I found that since I’ve been really saying, “this is my choice, this is my body, this is my life,” it’s actually been empowering for my family, specifically for my mother, to see me do this. Our relationship has changed just dramatically because she, at some point, had said to me basically, “I’m so proud of you and I’ve realized that there are things that I do that facilitate some bad patterns,” and we’ve worked on them… So we just took our relationship and completely went like that: upside down, downside up. [Zena] 5.2.2. Others’ Diet Talk. Disconnecting from other people in the women’s social networks, primarily friends and co-workers, as a result of talking about diets was an ongoing element of women’s relationships with other people. Navigating these problematic conversations, which appeared intended to focus women on bodily size and restriction, was an important component of women rejecting external gazes in order to re-focus on their own positive connection to their bodies. Most women spoke of simply disengaging from social relationships that involved diet talk whenever possible. I have had a few friends that I have discontinued being close friends with because their pre-occupation with their body. I think just having this constant broken record about how they feel bad about their body, I have had a hard time adjusting to it because I don’t have that. I don’t value it that way. I don’t see it that way. So I would be kind of like “get over it” [laughter]… That has been challenging with
169 some female friends of mine. I don’t think I have many of them anymore, very few, that are constantly, this constant drive to diet. Now I shy away from female friends that are more pre-occupied with that… I came back from maternity leave at work and every person in our lunchroom at work was talking about dieting. I stopped going there [laughter] because it was constant. They wouldn’t eat certain foods. I think it wasn’t even like they just did it and no one heard it, it was this constant chatter. We used to even have Weight Watchers for a while in our office and then it eventually discontinued. Just because I don’t have the same perspective, I find it challenging, too. I don’t need the drama. [Nimco] With regards to romantic partners, several women noted a shift whereby they became less willing to engage with partners who suggested they lose weight. When a guy says, “Oh, you’re gaining weight,” you realize he’s just insecure in himself and you don’t take it personally. Whereas… yourself at the age of 20, you’d try harder to please him. But when you’re nearing 30, you just think he’s an ass and you laugh and you’re onto the next guy. [Ann] Other women mentioned intervening when friends spoke about or engaged in dieting, in order to communicate the possibility that there are alternative options in women’s relationships with their bodies. Someone in our group was saying, “Oh, I think I need to lose weight and go to the gym.” And us talking her through and saying if you need to go to the gym, maybe that doesn’t need to be because you need to lose weight because what is deeper than that? Why are you saying, “I need to lose weight?” and talking her through that. [Ophelia] Several participants experienced dissonance with co-workers on the issue of dieting. One of the first experiences that I had with a lot of people dieting was at work, in my office where I am now. Because it’s at work it’s women who I’m not necessarily there with by choice… So there are five women and one man in the office and I think three of the women are dieting and that was weird at first for me
170 to be around them. I remember when I first started this guy who works down the hall brought some donuts in, like a welcome to the office, and me and one other woman were the only ones who ate them… And that was just kind of weird to me that they would not eat something that they might want to eat. [Pamelia] The most commonly mentioned response to diet talk was boredom, which women addressed in the focus group. Women also presented strategies they used to re-focus these conversations, including commenting on the unreasonable effort required to adhere to appearance norms. Gemma: I just don’t hang out with a lot of women in groups because the conversations just bore me to tears, honestly [laughter] I just can’t handle it and I walk away, I try and change the subject… a bunch of women… they were talking about celebrities and I said, “Look, if you had a personal trainer, a makeup artist, a hairstylist…” Kalli: A chef. Gemma: Yes. “If you had all of these people and it was your job to look good, you would look good.” Tali: Absolutely. Gemma: but nobody has the— Kalli: it’s not realistic. Gemma: this team at their disposal. People look that way because they’re paid to and they have all the tools and they have people who just are devoted to making them look good. This is not a measure that you should apply to yourself, but yet people do. Several women acknowledged the negative impact diet talk has on them, and expressed a sense of annoyance at being exposed to other women’s dieting and negative body focus. In response, these women created boundaries in order to avoid being exposed to negative body talk.
171 I am almost at the point where I get bored and I am sick of hearing about the same thing.… Say I have a friend who is constantly saying, “I feel like I am a bit too big and I want to lose a bit of weight,” or, “I feel like maybe I shouldn’t be eating so much,” and every time I talked to her about it and I talked to her about it in the next few weeks it’s the same thing and then the next few weeks after that it’s the same thing. I get to a point where I am like, “You know what? Stop talking to me about it… you are fine the way you are.” Fuck the—there are so many other things to enjoy. So I kind of put a cap on it when it gets too much… when it’s negative. [Ostara] In the focus group, women commented on a variation on diet talk, whereby other women appeared to be resistant to engaging in pleasurable activities. Kalli: Guilt seems to keep coming back as a theme. I don’t know what it is with people being resistant to doing things that they like… they seem to have all these reasons why, “No, I don’t want to do that. I shouldn’t do that.” There are a lot of shouldn’ts. And I don’t know where that stems from. It’s almost like they're too guilty to have a joyful experience. Tali: Because unless it’s also good for them in some other way… even if I want to try yoga, I can’t do that ’cause I'm not going to lose weight doing yoga… Kalli: Someone said to me, “I can’t do yoga until I get healthy enough to do it.” I’m like what, that doesn’t make sense at all [laughter]. I heard that so many times. I don’t understand what that’s supposed to mean… there’s some resistance for them to do things that make them happy and I think it goes across the board often for sex, for eating, for anything. Maybe there’s a part that’s just resistant to let go and enjoy. Tali: Or they don’t think they deserve it for some reason. This concludes the second theme within the chapter Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, namely,
172 Disengagement from Problematic Relationships. This theme included the sub-themes of Parental Judgement and Others’ Diet Talk. 5.3. Personal Practices All of the women rejected a variety of direct expectations regarding standard body and beauty practices, and activities that women are often expected to engage in based in conceptualizations of femininity in the western world. This rejection encompassed a personal refusal to participate in femininity norms and practices that did not reflect their values. Women in this study rejected a host of femininity norms and practices—from expected modes of interacting with others to cosmetic use, clothing, and hair maintenance, and all participants rejected dieting and weight loss as worthwhile goals. In the present chapter, Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, the third theme is entitled Personal Practices and it incorporates the sub-themes Living in the Body, Body Weight and Size, and Appearance and Beauty Practices (see Figure 11 for the delineation of sub-themes under the theme of Personal Practices). Figure 11. Sub-themes within the theme of Personal Practices.
Personal Practices
Living in the Body
Body Weight and Size
Appearance and Beauty Practices
173 5.3.1. Living in the Body. The women in this study rejected femininity norms related to the ways in which they lived in their bodies, as well as practices connected to general gendered expectations. This resistance and rejection enabled the women to re-focus on themselves, and included the ways that they interacted with others. I realized I was sick of playing certain relationship roles with people… letting go of this “the woman has to be so nice and gentle and the earth all the time, and connected and spiritual and supporting everybody…” I used to have this much more amiable personality that was adapting to whatever people wanted to talk about without stating my opinions on things and the more I move into that way of experiencing myself and that more alternative value sense, I can’t play that role anymore that I used to. It’s kind of a shedding of personality. [Ostara] Similarly, behavioural markers of womanhood were noted as relevant when comparing cross-cultural experiences. The women with immigration experiences were particularly critical of these expectations, and addressed differing conceptualizations regarding acceptable behaviour for women, including Ann, who identified her ethnocultural heritage as Brown and Caribbean of South Asian ancestry, and who immigrated twice as a child and youth. Here she discussed her experience living in a Caribbean country. I think there’s a bigger range in terms of body type for what’s acceptable, but there’s still a lot of unacceptable things. Female sexuality, unacceptable. Dark skin, unacceptable. Curly hair… unacceptable. So there’s plenty of other ways that women are unacceptable. It’s just in terms of body size there’s a lot more leeway… maybe I was kind of giving up on looking a certain way because my skin was wrong, my hair was wrong, my body shape was wrong, but there’s still the ability to be really good and fit in socially if you’re quiet and shy and respectful… I was being rebellious about the body type but still trying to be a nice girl. Because I couldn’t fit in body-type wise… The physical was impossible for
174 me to strive to, and then the emotional, what you’re supposed to be, how you’re supposed to act, I kind of liked being myself. [Ann] A number of participants rejected expectations regarding women’s life choices and behaviour in the realms of marriage and child bearing. I spend a lot of time developing things that I can do on my own, so I’m comfortable being alone and if that’s the route then so be it, if I never get married, these are irrelevant to me. I’m not fixated on marriage or having kids. [Kalli] With regards to living in their bodies in a manner that is often not considered acceptable for women, embracing sexual pleasure in their bodies was an important element of joyful body experiences and body acceptance for almost all participants. With regards to sexual pleasure, Nimco stated, “it is a right.” Some of the women related their open enjoyment of food to their open enjoyment of sex, including Jade who currently has access to financial privilege. I like food, I like eating… it’s really pleasurable, it’s very fulfilling; I created this and now I am consuming it and now I feel great. Just the satisfaction when you’re really hungry and you take that first bite. It’s like a little orgasm [laughter]. It’s like that catholic kid who’s masturbating, that’s totally what I think about it. This is so good but so wrong, nom nom nom [laughter]. It’s good, just eat it! [Jade] The women’s sense of resistance extended to contrasting their engagement in pleasurable activities, including love of food, with the expectation that women worry all the time. It’s really hard to pinpoint what enables you to allow something to feel good… Sometimes there’s that filter, there’s that kind of psychological, cultural, social filter that says I should feel guilty about eating this food or I should feel guilty about doing this. Or, you know, this isn’t supposed to feel good, or whatever. My filter is really bad [laughter]. [Jade]
175 Bodily experiences were sometimes limited due to constraints related to culture. For example, Krishna was born in South Asia, is Muslim, and dresses conservatively. For her, modesty is a cultural dictate. I don’t know how to swim. I want to start swimming. This is because I don’t like wearing a bathing suit. And then I read our university guidelines that you can actually wear tights and a T-shirt and I was like, oh, then I should start swimming. [Krishna] Several women noted that their parents had immigrated to Canada and were interested in integrating into Canadian culture, and avoided putting pressures on them related either to Canadian ideals or to their home countries’ ideals regarding feminine behaviour or activities, though academic pressures were frequently mentioned. Kalli’s parents’ emigrated from Asia. My parents are “this is the melting pot of different cultures.” So I think they’re actually a little bit more open, because they weren’t imposing the cultural expectations on me being in a new country.… I was welcomed to do other activities as long as it never impacted my grades. So I was always expected straight A’s, university was not even like a question, I had to go and do really well as well. So as long as those things are being met, they’re pretty understanding. [Kalli] Several women also noted their rejection of mainstream cultural expectations and adherence to and enjoyment of cultural activities, such as Krishna, who was born in South Asia, who stated, “I tend to not go with mainstream… I like my [specific ethnic identity] music, I like my culture, I like my food, I’m not going to change that.” Several women noted a mix of beneficial and detrimental aspects of their cross-cultural location. Both of Radha’s parents had immigrated to Canada. I did have a close-knit South Asian family of models in the South Asian community… I have been told by my parents that we have to work harder, as
176 immigrant children and as a visible minority. And the concept of working harder was to work harder to be at the same level as a Caucasian Canadian in Canada. And so I was encouraged to do that and to make myself stand out or exceed or excel in all ways. So I never felt like my beauty was all that I had and I was always told that I was precious and beautiful as I was… I’ve learned to be more accepting of difference, because of my ethnic background. I knew it was different, and I knew it was good and it was encouraged as a child, the language, the food, the music, the beliefs. [Radha] For a number of the women, their immigration experiences clarified the irrelevance of focusing on aspects of themselves that others might judge. Nimco noted the ways that her attention was focused on her difficult immigration experience as a child moving to Canada from East Africa with her family. Coming to Canada… to worry about how I looked or whatever, that was nothing compared to trying to get into the school system and make sense of that and trying to make sure that you were studying something that you thought was of value to you versus the level the system considered you to be… put back in classes that were slow learning because I didn’t speak English, so for me being judged on certain things that I didn’t have control… from some of my early experiences in Canada, I learned as much as possible that you can’t change external stuff. I can’t change the colour of my skin… It was this feeling of you couldn’t move the system… when you come from another country you don’t know how the system works… when people box you into a little square, it definitely is a different challenge. [Nimco] Nimco noted that her immigration experience took years to resolve, and resulted in her experiencing anger and powerlessness and focussing on resolving her academic placement rather than on her appearance.
177 5.3.2. Body Weight and Size. Others’ external gaze imposed the expectation that women’s pleasant feelings in their bodies should be contingent on their body weight, body size, and body shape. This imposition of external conditions was repeatedly noted as an impediment to experiencing joy. At times, many of the women experienced a challenge in maintaining belief in their own value, acceptability, or beauty, while withstanding the gaze and judgment of others. Jade described her ethnocultural heritage as Indigenous, and her body type as short and chubby. Conflicting feelings, where some days you’re like, I feel great and awesome, and other days being, not really frustrated with yourself and wanting to change yourself, but frustrated at how other people see it. I don’t care that I have a big stomach or that I have fat in particular places, but I feel like other people do, and that’s the frustrating part, and not turning it into self-hatred is like trying to keep this beast at bay.… And so there are days where you do wish you looked different, not because of any sort of self-hatred or self-doubt, but just because you just want other people to stop asking if you’re pregnant. [Jade] Similarly, the disconnect between women’s own comfort with themselves and others’ external gaze was also addressed by Tali in the focus group. I’m happy with myself, I’m happy with what I see in the mirror… but I still, I wish that it didn’t matter what other people thought… I wish there wasn’t an expectation that I owe it to anyone else to look good and that’s still one of my pet peeves is that it seems like we have to look pretty for other people’s approval and that’s the one thing that I still can’t get over. I can wander around naked in my apartment and I’m like, everything is amazing, [laughter] and then I’m at the gym and I’m like, oh, ew, I don’t know. I am perfectly happy with myself, but I’m uncomfortable if someone else is going to be uncomfortable by looking at me and that really bothers me, because why in the world should they be uncomfortable looking at me? [Tali]
178 Some activities required explicit resistance to external gaze, particularly those that revealed a woman’s body, such as swimming. Several participants noted that swimming was a mixed experience because of bodily anxiety related to appearance in a bathing suit, however, they were able to engage with swimming in ways that enabled them to continue to have joyful experiences in the water. I’ve only recently gotten back into being at beaches, because they were too public, and it was public change rooms and you’d have to trot out and you felt like you’re on a runway or something. It was the spectacle and the gaze of other people that made me uncomfortable. I was fine if I went to a friend’s cottage, or I was at a camp… There was always this anxiety leading up to getting into the pool, because you have to put on a bathing suit and they’re revealing and tight and awkward, and I was the kid who wore the big T-shirt over their bathing suit, even though once you’re wet it doesn’t matter [laughter]. It was this comfort thing, and that was the place I felt comfortable, I felt I could have fun and be myself without worrying about how my body looked cause I was in the water. And it didn’t matter, I felt there was more freedom of movement. Fat equals buoyancy [laughter], so it was great. [Jade] The conflict between these women’s own comfort with themselves and their discomfort with another’s gaze occurred overtly when women experienced street harassment related to body size or weight. Though this harassment was impossible to avoid, they enacted strategies to cope with it. Zena identified her sexual orientation as homosexual, and she is married to a woman. You get idiots on the street that yell things at you from cars as you walk down the street and it kills me. It still kills me. They did, in fact, a few months back… I had to actually say to myself, Okay. I've been through this before, and yes, he was an idiot, but I can’t give him any more power than he’s already taken so I have to do something… that night my wife and I were going out to a club… So I just breathed it out, I just moved it out, I had my cry, it was good and then I got dressed up, I curled my hair, I put on something really slutty [laughter] and, when I went out, by the time I was ready to go out, I wasn’t thinking about it anymore.
179 How else can you deal with it? Because, otherwise, if someone had done that to me, like they had done that to me back in university, it just would make me miserable for days, possibly weeks. Really, if you’re not prepared for something like that, then how do you deal with it? [Zena] As the women’s own process of accepting themselves developed, their response to others’ external gaze shifted and the experience often transitioned from being mixed to being joyful. If I was in a particularly bad way with my body at the time, I would feel like the pool was kind of the only place that I felt good about my body. Almost like I could hide my shape and size and no one would notice. No one would see I was fat if I was in the water. And now I can be fat and enjoy the water. And it’s great. [Tali] Several women noted they were active in part because of adherence to the belief that activity allowed them to enjoy food or to eat what they wanted. These women were endeavouring to find ways in which to negotiate their own eating experiences, which were generally positive and responsive to their desires and hunger, within the context of a culture that is focused on restriction and control. Another motivator why I am so active is because I want to continue enjoying food. It doesn’t have to be vast quantities. And I always tell people don’t feel guilty. If you really want that, don’t eat a lot of it, just eat it and enjoy it. But there’s no point in eating it and then feeling bad about it, because you’re taking away the experience that you’re entitled to… It’s not like I’m genetically predisposed to burn fat better than other people, I eat them [pastries] because I like them… It’s just I choose to be active to be able to maintain a lifestyle. [Kalli] Recently Pamelia became a competitive athlete which required her to stay in a weight class and thus to restrict her eating in order to engage competitively in her sport. In this way, her
180 engagement in rowing, an activity that is generally empowering to her, could be considered to be disruptive to her general sense of freedom with food consumption. Pamelia identified her body type as slim, athletic, short, and average. For races you have to be in a certain weight class. So I have never had to think about, “I want to lose 10 pounds…” I’m right at the top of the light weight class and now all of a sudden I have to think about okay, I can’t gain three pounds or I can’t race on Saturday or whenever. And it’s not that hard, like it’s not like I’m about to gain a whole bunch of weight, but I just have to be careful. I still have to eat enough to give me enough energy to do all these things, but I also just have to be smart about it… that’s something that I’ve never really done before, I just sort of always generally tried to eat healthy, but didn’t stress out about it. So now it’s just sort of on a list of things that I think about. [Pamelia] This is in contrast to Tali; prior to her complete rejection of the practice of dieting, the need to be strong when swimming on the varsity swim team during the school year freed her from her summertime practice of dieting. I usually dieted in the summer, because I wasn’t competing in swimming and I didn’t diet while I was competing because even I knew that wasn’t a good idea ’cause I would have no energy. It just would have been a very bad idea to swim 25 hours a week and restrict my food, so I didn’t. So then throughout the school year I didn't diet… I gained 20 pounds by the end of the school year, which was pretty standard for me. [Tali] Body and weight constrictions occurred in the context of varied social experiences. One woman experienced complete body acceptance with herself, however, with friends she sometimes engaged in body policing. I knew this one girl ever since we were in Grade 7 and she was super-energetic and now she’s not so energetic and she’s also gained tons of weight… she’s always been consistently fit and now I guess she’s just let go. Or something. But it was kinda sad to see… weight is good as long as you can do whatever you want
181 to do. As soon as it stops you or prevents you from doing something you like to do, then it’s a problem… I’ve never checked the scale. Ever. And regardless—my aunts and cousins come up to me and they’ll be like, “oh, you've gained weight.” But that doesn’t mean I turn around and do extra hours of exercise. It’s like okay, so it’s wintertime. It’s natural. [Krishna] An important element of the body experiences of women with a history of immigration was the varying cross-cultural expectations from one country to another regarding body size, shape, and weight. Ann identified her ethnocultural heritage as Brown and Caribbean of South Asian ancestry. She spoke about the impact of being born in Canada, growing up in the Caribbean, and moving back to Canada, and her navigation of differing beauty norms in both locations. And I think growing up in [the Caribbean] as a teenager where it’s bad to be skinny and it’s better to be curvy, not necessarily overweight, but very curvy and round in figure, and then coming here and looking exactly the same, and suddenly it was good to look the way I did, which was very scrawny.… I stopped letting it bother me because everyone has a different opinion. And nobody can really agree on what they think about how a female body should look.… having those two cultures with conflicting messages about how you should look. You can’t really absorb any of those negative body images too much because you’re always being told something different… You’re getting contradictory information… You get so many messages and it’s impossible to really make sense of it that you just give up trying to. [Ann] These varying expectations applied to other cultures as well. Krishna emigrated from South Asia as a child with her family and remains connected to her specific South Asian culture. In our culture, it’s good to be more fleshier or more bigger, whereas in the western culture, you see all these fashion models and they’re literally bone-thin and that’s what you see young women or young girls look at. They go, “oh, we
182 aspire to be like that.” Whereas not everybody can have that body structure because there’s so many different body structures. [Krishna] A few of the women with smaller bodies lived within a North American cultural context in which thinner is perceived as better. However, embedded within this were their family and home cultures in which women of their cultural backgrounds may not strive for thinness, but rather for shapeliness, and the women did not meet this shapely ideal. Notably, these women had the capacity to resist a focus on their body types in favour of focusing on enjoying their experiences in their bodies. Regardless, they were engaged in a process of negotiating acceptable bodies within their sub-cultural and family understandings. Judy described herself as a Canadian woman of Asian descent, and addressed her specific cultural context. That culture really promotes being fair and a very kind of specific ideal of what a woman should look like and how she should present herself. I find also that, more so now than before, there was more of a push to be not necessarily thin but shapely, slender but shapely… I always felt there was a disconnect between that, the idealized form, and what’s there… there’s a difference in the cultural values and cultural ways of looking at beauty. But the basics are still there… in my case they would always push me to eat more [laughter] so I think part of that will apply. I think their attitude was, “oh if you have it then good, but if you don’t oh well too bad.” [Judy] A rejection of thinness as linked to womanliness was addressed repeatedly during the focus group. Four hundred pounds is always the scary thing… People see a woman who’s very fat and they say, “Oh, my God, she must be 200 pounds.” When I passed 200 pounds, it was the most amazing revelation where I hardly looked any different. I’m 240 pounds now and I don’t think people look at me and think that, because people don’t know what different weights look like… there’s lots of stigma around. It seems like 200 pounds is a man weight. [Tali]
183 In the focus group, women critically discussed unrealistic expectations regarding striving to alter one’s body and their experience with physical activity not impacting body size. Tali: You can’t tell how healthy someone is by looking at them.… And the equating of exercise and physical activity with the ability to change how your body looks is a problem… because it just doesn’t happen… idea that you just have to work harder and then you’ll get the shape that you want is so frustrating. Kalli: Then you’re not working hard enough so it’s again a failure. Tali: Because it just doesn’t happen. Some people may absolutely start going to the gym and drop 20 pounds, but other people won’t. Clothing was an important element of women’s subversion of weight and body expectations. Several women expressed disinterest in fashion, including Gemma who stated, “I’m not really into fashion. It makes people look all the same.” For the most part, the women in this study focussed on their own desires regarding what to wear. It’s a choice to have my own style so that I don’t care what other people are wearing or how they look… it doesn’t matter what is dictated by fashion trends. And I see what it does to women, because women want to wear the clothes they see in magazines and it may not suit their body type at all. I just don’t want to be part of that whole mess… I’ve chosen this attitude where I’m not defining my body as big or small any more, it is what it is and I’m just going to wear things that I find comfortable, flattering and that work for me… Every spring anything that I find doesn’t fit well or doesn’t look good, I donate, I get rid of them, I don’t keep them around. I only keep clothes that I feel make me feel good about myself. [Kalli] Women in this study spoke about the importance of feeling good in their clothes. This particularly applied to women who identified as having larger bodies. It is so worth wearing something that makes me feel good because, as a lady that’s a little bit larger, there are only certain stores that you can go to… There are
184 stores out there that cater to you… Yes, you are big but that doesn’t mean you can’t be absolutely lovely. [Zena] At times, clothing had the potential to be limiting and disruptive. Regardless, these women maintained the desire and capacity to connect to their bodies in positive ways. I think I look a lot better in underclothes than in regular clothes because I don’t think regular clothes that’s fashionable really suits most body types. So, I have this big mirror in my room. And when I’m changing, I usually like to dance around in front of it. I like how I look in my underclothing… I used to be really, really scrawny like a stick and I liked myself just fine, but now I’m curvier, a little bit curvier and I actually like having a bottom and I like having hips… I know that it’s not supposed to be a good thing that you’re gaining weight, but I think that it looks good. I’ve outgrown all my nice, pretty fashionable clothing so I kind of feel a little bad sometimes when I try and squish into it because they don’t fit. And I think that’s why I like how I look in underwear better because it’s stretchy and it still fits and it looks good and it just suits me better. [Ann] Several women noted the potential negative impact of clothing on them and the choice to re-interpret the problem as not being their bodies, but as a problem with the clothing. I can imagine people going, “am I that big, am I that big?” It’s not to say I don’t have moments where it’s hmm, this tight bra… I’m choosing to interpret it as this bra is so tight that it’s pushing my skin and so I just need something that fits better. [Kalli] A few women lamented the loss of fashion in their lives due to their increased body size, even as they recognized the benefits of embracing alternative clothing or fashions. I do like fashion and that’s where some of the bothersome messages come from because I’ve noticed that a lot of the really nice things that I like to wear, and even me, I’m still relatively thin and I can't even fit in it properly because it, the thing that will go up my hips is too wide in the waist and the dresses that fit on the top have these enormous sections for my breasts, but this tiny, tiny little waist…
185 with the metal scene or the rock scene it’s not about dressing like that. You can wear your ripped T-shirts and you can wear your skirts and clothing fits better and you’re fashionable… it’s kind of sad to part ways with fashion. It was easy to be fashionable when I was really, really scrawny and wearing padded bras, but nowadays just being myself fashion doesn’t work for me so well, so I just wear what fits and try and be fashionable in my own way. [Ann] In the focus group, women discussed the impact of sizing and clothing on activity, with regards to a popular active-wear company. Kalli: There’s an image, and when I talk to people they say, “I need to get in shape to do yoga…” Tali: When the clothes in the store top out at a size 12, it sends a message… Kalli: They feel like they have to look a certain way to do yoga… you should be able to wear whatever. It’s not about looking a certain way… Tali: You might cut out a whole bunch of people, ’cause I can’t afford $100 pants. Similarly, other women experienced challenges with clothing and shopping due to a lack of financial resources, including Ophelia, who described herself as a working class woman. How could I ever afford to go shopping with my friends? Never mind how am I going to fit into anything when we go shopping… for me, always there were just other pressures… when you grow up poor, generally it’s not about choosing but surviving. [Ophelia] All women negotiated constraints regarding their body size, shape and weight, however ultimately, all participants expressed contentment regarding their bodies. I feel good ’cause I never had those issues of, “oh, I want to be this particular size, I can't eat that because then I’ll gain a pound.” Or “I want to be size zero.” You know, I'm size 12 and I’m totally happy with that. [Krishna]
186 Indeed, regardless of the judgement of others, all accepted their body size. Kalli identified her body type as muscular. All our bodies have a comfortable range of weight they naturally gravitate towards. So there’s no point in me starving myself and then it wanting to be back in its optimal range. So that’s the way I kind of perceive it. And if it doesn’t meet society’s ideals, I couldn’t care less, really. [Kalli] Several participants felt they did not need to worry about their weight, due to their smaller body size. Pamelia noted, “I never worried about dieting or weight, for sure, I never remember not eating something because I was worried about gaining weight.” Ultimately, all of the women personally rejected the dominant beauty ideal of thinness and valued other identifiers. When I look in the mirror I feel good, but I don’t look in the mirror a lot. I think an ideal that I have had for my body is I want to feel more womanly lately, which has been more voluptuous and curvy and full. I like the idea of feeling full and strong and so the more I feel that way in my body the better, the better I feel. [Ostara] 5.3.3. Appearance and Beauty Practices. Several women progressively removed one aspect of femininity-based expectations related to appearance and beauty practices after another from their lives. This resistance mitigated the external gaze and enabled women to focus on their own choices regarding personal practices and body experiences, primarily joy. The women in this study spoke about not needing to look beautiful or engage with consumer culture, and enacted those beliefs. Going against the grain of what is supposed to be comfortable to be as a woman.… If I wanted to be happy and feel good about myself, it didn’t make sense to do those things and the values that supported those weren’t going to make me happy in this holistic sense… related to menstrual experiences too and I stopped using tampons and pads and using a Diva cup… Then just removing one traditional thing after another… I don’t remove body hair. I don’t wear makeup. I
187 just have this moisturizer for dry skin, that’s it… I refuse to wear heels. I never blow dry my hair… I don’t wear any jewellery… I didn’t wash my hair for a year just to get out of that “I don’t have to look beautiful with all this shiny glamour all the time” thing. Or, not using any body products like deodorant or cream and just totally stepping out of that whole kind of consumer aspect of the way the body is supposed to be presented. [Ostara] Several of the women struggled with a disparity between their external image as evaluated by others and reflected in the mirror, and their own embodied experiences of enjoying being in their bodies. There will be times when I’m actually having a fabulous time and I’ll go to use the bathroom in some public place and I’m having a fabulous time and I look like that? I look like ugh. I’m all sweaty, or I’ve got spinach in my teeth, or whatever. So that’s another one that sometimes throws me off. I’m like what am I looking at, and is this an accurate representation of me? It’s not that I’m distrustful of mirrors necessarily, but it does make me wonder what I’m looking at and is it how I feel? [Radha] However, a setting with a lack of mirrors provided freedom from that particular constraint and freedom from others’ external gaze. Radha shared such an experience: “There are no mirrors. There’s all-natural shampoo, you might not use conditioner, you don’t care… it just doesn’t matter. And for me, maybe that part of it is a release, because it’s like I can’t see myself, I don’t care.” Similarly, several women noted that when others were not overtly observing them, they were able to let go of their concern with an external gaze. I didn’t care what anyone thought… It’s a nice experience as well when everyone else is enjoying the same experience because no one’s looking at you, no one is judging your dance moves or your body or anything like that. [Tali]
188 At times, women noted their own varying interpretations of other’s response to their appearance, even while they attempted to reject others’ gaze. In the focus group discussion, Kalli commented on other people’s judgments regarding her shaved head, noting it was a “step towards liberation from being stereotyped or judged… Now people just kind of look at me and don’t have any preconceived notions because they just don’t know what to make of me without hair.” However, during her individual interview, she stated that her experience of the other’s gaze continued to be negative. I get a lot of weird looks, like “why did you shave off your hair,” and people are very curious because they think it’s so unfeminine. Women tend to be defined by their hair, that’s a symbol of femininity, and so it’s in times like that where I’m made aware that oh, I guess people are still judging me, but it doesn’t matter at all because I just don’t care. [Kalli] These body-based judgements at times applied to women who were visible members of an ethnic group, and who experienced judgement from other members of that group. Kalli identified her ethnocultural heritage as Canadian-Asian and outlined such an experience during the focus group. When I walk in Chinatown, they’re thinking, “What did her parents do wrong?” There are definitely judgments because I’m so not your typical [Asian] girl, without the hair and everything like that. Usually we’re supposed to be, you know, long straight hair, very quiet, no tattoos. [Kalli] For some of the larger bodied women, rejecting expectations involved embracing femininity in socially sanctioned ways that they felt were not available to them as fat women, and they engaged in subversive forms of accommodation to femininity norms and beauty practices. Tali described her body type as fat, in-betweenie, plus sized, and chubby. I started wearing makeup in January of this year and it was something that I’ve wanted to do. I think because I’m not dieting and because I’m fat accepting, that I
189 wanted to do something else to have fun and express myself and make myself feel pretty.… it’s also a little bit political in that fat women are not supposed to be pretty. We’re supposed to hide under a paper bag and just bemoan the fact that we’re not thin. So if I can dress in a fun way and wear skirts and wear makeup and that sort of thing, there’s no reason that I shouldn’t be able to if I want to. So it’s a statement. [Tali] However, the majority of women rejected cosmetic use. For several women, though they did not struggle financially with basic necessities, excess money was directed only towards essential items. Judy noted that her family was not deeply impoverished, “but we did struggle to get by… not necessarily wanting to focus on using your resources on makeup or clothing.” Most of the women who rejected cosmetics also rejected the expectations and beliefs related to cosmetic use. I got into wearing makeup because lots of other women were wearing makeup and they were like “Why don’t you wear makeup?”…friends that I had pretty much were “I can’t go anywhere without this makeup,” or my mom being always having to put makeup on in the morning. I felt like I couldn’t feel secure unless I put makeup on when I went into public. I felt like that was a really stupid thing to have dependency on… It just started feeling gross to put it on and I just didn’t like the feeling of it.… I learned about different animal products they put in the makeup and I was also grossed out by it. [Ostara] Other women commented on rejecting appearance norms in order to focus on the importance of feeling free and comfortable in their clothing, including Ostara. “I stopped wearing bras and underwear. Last summer I was travelling and I broke my bra so I didn’t have one and it just felt better to work sweaty outside without one.… there is something really liberating about that.” External gaze and judgement regarding women’s clothing choices was also remarked upon by several women. Ann, who described her ethnocultural heritage as Brown
190 and Caribbean of South Asian ancestry, commented on her experience of external judgement of her clothing when living in the Caribbean. I went to the market with my dad and he was randomly talking to some other man, and this man was like, “Why is your daughter dressed like that? You know, it's inappropriate. She's showing her legs.” And in my mind I’m thinking, “well, it’s 40 degrees Celsius. Of course I’m going to wear shorts.” But, strangers, especially men, just feel they can comment about you and there’s not a lot you can say. So it really breaks down your self-esteem in some ways and I tried to be really strong about it and not care. [Ann] Several women commented on the importance of ignoring any external gaze and wearing clothes that felt complementary, while providing movement and sensuality. Ophelia described her body type as fat, pear-shaped, and big breasted. There’s this one dress and it’s kind of rockabilly. It’s got a huge circumference. And it has these gorgeous embroidered birds on it that someone has hand embroidered… It is a beautiful piece of work, and to put it on yourself and to have it fit is rare for me, but also is marvellous. And all you do is just spin and this beautiful feeling of spinning, but also the waves of the dress, I love that dress [satisfied sigh].… I feel really sexy, and unafraid. Maybe a little more bold, audacious. [Ophelia] Most of the women wore what they found comfortable regardless of trends and expectations regarding women’s attire. Krishna addressed the lack of availability of comfortable styles of pants. I don’t like to follow mainstream. I know what I feel comfortable in and I try to pursue that. I’m not going to go and buy skinnies just because that's the only thing that’s available. I’ll just wait ’til boot cuts become available again. [Krishna] Kalli noted that her attire during adolescence impacted her experience, as she was freed from the potential constraints of others’ external gaze and reactions to her.
191 I started wearing a uniform. So I think that was a huge, huge plus. I would think if I went to a high school where there weren’t uniforms, I might be very different today, but not having to care about your clothing was a huge plus. [Kalli] The issue of skin tone as a marker of beauty applied to several women of colour, as Radha noted, “in the South Asian community to be fair is better.” Several women of colour also discussed hair on their head and various types of body hair as deeply intertwined with their resistance to gendered bodily expectations around appearance and beauty. For the longest time my ideal hair was short, straight bangs and straight hair. Do I really care? No. And do I really want to struggle to try and make my hair look like that? Absolutely not. I’d rather encourage the curls that I have. [Radha] Several women spoke about the meaning of hair as it related to their sense of themselves, and their value. One participant decided to shave her head in order to reject these pressures. I became very concerned about my hair when I had hair. The placement, the colour, the shape… I drove myself crazy… a bad hair day would really throw me off when I was young, “oh, I look terrible, this is unflattering.” I spent so much money on products and so much time on just primping and then you go outside and you can’t control the humidity and you can’t control the wind… and then when my hair is perfectly done it was like “wow, I look so much better than when the wind blew it away”. So that dramatic shift on how I felt about myself over something as insignificant as these dead cells on my head, why let that dictate my happiness. When I shaved it all off that was, again, a rebellion against myself… it was very liberating and I could never grow it back. [Kalli] For several women, particularly women of colour, feelings about their hair were an important element of their experience of negotiating the external gaze, in order to connect with their own internal experience. I was a teenager in [the Caribbean], and curly hair is bad. It’s bad hair. It’s not straight. So I used to get teased about it a lot… And for a long time I really, really
192 didn’t like my hair. And I came here… And it wasn’t so humid, so it wasn’t such a struggle to do my hair all the time. It looked so different and people didn’t tease me all the time, and I got to learn how to do my hair properly. I really like my hair. And it’s funny because I’ve had a lot of boyfriends in the past tell me I should straighten my hair… I should dye my hair blond or put highlights in it. And I’ve always been really contrary about it, so I’m very stubborn because I like my hair the way it is and I really don’t care what other people say. [Ann] All women commented on their rejection of at least some expected practices of body hair removal. Ostara stated, “I stopped getting waxes and shaving my pubic hair. Then I stopped shaving my legs.” Others steadfastly refused to adhere to contemporary norms around body hair removal. I refuse to shave my crotch.… I’ve had guys in the past request that, but I won’t. I’m not a child and that’s not comfortable. No sharp object is going there. So I refuse to do that which apparently is very rare these days. [Ann] A few women noted positive cross-cultural experiences, including varying norms regarding body hair in different locations, which resulted in women’s sense of a broader range of options. Krishna stated, “Shaving hair is such a huge thing in Canada. You go to [Krishna’s home country] and nobody shaves their hair and they wear skirts up to their knees and no one cares.” Ultimately, while rejecting cultural standards of beauty, all of the women were happy with their appearance. Ostara stated, “I think I am pretty beautiful. I feel pretty good about the way I look.” Similarly, Pamelia stated, I feel content. I like how my body looks. I’m not overly concerned with how I look, so I wouldn’t say I spend a lot of time looking at myself or worrying about what my hair looks like, or I don’t really wear makeup.
193 This concludes the third theme within the chapter Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, namely, Personal Practices. This theme included the sub-themes of Living in the Body, Body Weight and Size, and Appearance and Beauty Practices.
5.4 Critical Political Consciousness For most of the women, their critical political stance and overtly political resistance enabled them to reject others’ external constraining gaze by re-focusing on their own beliefs and values; hence, their joyful experiences did not need to adhere to external expectations. All of the women maintained a critical political consciousness, which addressed a variety of issues related to their bodies. Critical Political Consciousness includes the sub-themes of Embracing Alternative Values and Communities of Resistance and Joy (see Figure 12 for the delineation of sub-themes under the theme of Critical Political Consciousness). Figure 12. Sub-themes within the theme of Critical Political Consciousness.
Critical Political Consciousness Embracing Alternative Values
Communities of Resistance and Joy
5.4.1. Embracing Alternative Values. When women engaged in joyful body activities, they were connected to their own values and created lives that reflected and reinforced those values. Several participants expressly noted that their engagement in joyful body activities represented their political values with respect to challenging the mainstream, and these values supported them while they rejected others’ external
194 gaze. Ostara stated, “I see that coming at the same time the more I kind of internalize and enact those alternative values as well.” Additionally, several women noticed the protective influence of rejecting culturally normative beliefs. Ophelia noted that she is “not being so engaged in mainstream culture to think that I had to go on diets and had to not be okay with my size.” A primary value often repeated by participants was that joyful body experiences should and can be available to everyone, regardless of their social or physical restrictions and any issue of accessibility. Ophelia stated that it was important to her, “knowing that joyful body experiences can be in every day and can be for everyone.” Similarly, Jade stated, “there were three things that we decided every person should be able to enjoy, which was physical activity, food and sex, regardless of ability, body size, whatever.” With regards to their values and beliefs related to beauty, in the focus group, women rejected the ideal of beauty as the highest goal attainable for a woman. She said, “Your cousin, she is so beautiful, she should be a model.” And I said to her, “I think she can do better than that” [laughter]. I was really pissed off with that statement, so she’s good looking so she can’t do anything else and she should be a model… what makes people think that that would be the best thing ever… if you’re judged purely by your looks. [Gemma] In the focus group, women identified expectations related to beauty, weight, and appearance norms as deeply linked to gendered expectations. Kalli: Is there any culture where guys feel the same sort of constraint or pressure to look like any ideal?… Resource ideal, usually… but body ideal? I don’t think so. Tali: There’s a little bit of pressure like skinny guys are considered not as attractive as guys who are more muscular…
195 Kalli: At the end of the day, you can have a whole range of guys with hair, without hair, skinny, large or whichever and they can find women because women like charm… Tali: Yes, so women are how they look and men are what they do. Many women identified never having had a particular interest in adhering to beauty norms. Judy described her socioeconomic class as always having been working class. I don’t want to be preoccupied with something as trivial as my image when there are other things that I should be focused on or aware of… I was kind of resisting the norm… the media and with my friends and classmates, they seemed as though body image was kind of used as a distraction… it didn’t really appeal to me [laughter]… I didn’t want to participate, I suppose. I like to be involved, community involved and academically involved. I was working part time as well. I just felt that I didn’t really need that to fulfil any kind of self-satisfaction. [Judy] Other women noted that their values, self-esteem, and beliefs did not centre on appearance. It wasn’t something for me that I had to look a certain way or I had a certain image of myself… I have never had a worry about how I look. It has just never been a central value of my identity that I need to look a certain way or I need to be a certain size. [Nimco] Several women valued their intelligence, knowledge acquisition, and learning as important and as a more worthwhile focus than appearance. I care more about my mental well-being and just being smart because I feel that’s a really powerful thing to have. I think that just liking knowledge and thinking that’s more important makes me less caring about physical appearance too. [Ann] Several women referred to overtly rejecting accepted beauty ideals, for themselves and for others. Tali noted, “People can look good or not good and it’s really nobody’s business. I
196 think I’ve really bought into that idea that you are not required to be pretty for anybody.” While others rejected mainstream ideals around what constitutes beauty. There aren’t really any ugly people… if I think about all the people I know and who I find most attractive, it’s not really about who takes care of themselves the most or who does a certain thing, it’s more about their personality… a lot of people are beautiful because they’re different, because they have some unique feature. [Pamelia] Several women stated that their values represented resistance to gendered expectations as a result of their own sense of personal protest. Radha noted, “I think a lot of it was personal resistance to things that were going on around me and the crazy things that I saw girls doing to be with boys and to be accepted and to get a date.” Women’s values were also related to their own personal characteristics, for example, around rejection of the peer pressure to diet. Nimco noted, “I am not a follower. I think that is probably the best way to put it. I have never been.” Women’s beliefs and rejection of pressure regarding body size, weight, and shape pre-occupation also reflected their independence. I’m pretty independent and I don’t like to listen to people tell me stuff, like “you should do it this way.” Why? And if they don't have an adequate answer for my why, then “why should I listen to you” is my retort. [Krishna] Many of the women connected their rejection of dieting to their political beliefs and activism around the issue of weight loss. I just didn’t want to harm myself that way anymore, I didn’t want to hate myself. But it’s become more and more political, as I’ve become more and more political. So my reasons for doing it have started to shift a little bit. Just not dieting is not that difficult as long as you’re really quiet about it… But in order to be actively, openly not dieting for a reason and not tolerating diet talk around you, which is something that I have now come to do, which I didn't do before… now I will jump in and change the subject, if I can. Or sometimes I will say, “I don’t want to
197 talk about this, I find it triggering because I have bad past experience with dieting and I deliberately don’t diet any more, can we talk about something else.” So I will actually stop it. And that, I think, is harder. [Tali] In the focus group, women addressed the futility of striving to control their appearance and bodies. Kalli: Your body changes. There’s no point in getting too attached to how you look one day or another. Tali: That’s really crucial because there’s women who fight against ageing and women who fight against weight gain at various points in life. Kalli: Yes. It’s a losing battle. You are inevitably going to change, that’s the only thing that you can depend on… Tali: You can’t stop the ageing process [laughter]. Gemma: Change is constant… Tali: The alternative to changing is dying, so if you would like to stay alive… then you should [laughter] accept it. The women with immigration experiences often critically discussed the similarities and differences between cultures; however, they also discussed beliefs regarding the difficulty in critiquing their home cultures. In the Caribbean, even though a lot of people, “oh, it’s great, they like larger ladies,” but I find they just look for other ways to make you feel bad about your looks there.… A lot of people from the Caribbean are very invested in, even females, are very invested in making it seem as if it’s harmonious because it’s part of their ethnic identity that they’re trying to protect. And there are so many negative assumptions about people from Caribbean, people of colour. People from developing countries are very defensive about protecting their culture and their heritage, so it’s in their best interests to say, “my culture is great, they love people.” They’re going to downplay the homophobia and the sexism. [Ann]
198 For several participants, their environmental beliefs impacted how they consumed goods and products. Some women described their joyful body experiences pertaining to food consumption as connected to their critical beliefs regarding the environment. Radha’s chronic digestive illness has impacted her relationship with food. My value of food and its role in my life has increased, and it’s goodness for me, and my love of it, and my enjoyment of it. And as an environmentalist, I kind of consider us to be the earth, so we’re eating the sun through different forms, whether it’s plants or animals.… eating local, organic. [Radha] Through environmental beliefs, other women derived a sense of joy from, for example, making their own clothes or making their own soothing self-care products, as Ostara noted, “that also has an environmental twist to it. I would rather create my own shampoos or things to clean my body.” Other women’s environmental beliefs impacted their choice of joyful body experiences, particularly activities that reduced dependence on transportation systems or on consumerism. Connected to the same reason I like biking, being able to use myself to get from different places. I love being able to make things myself, being able to knit a pair of mittens or some socks or whatever, or being able to hem my own pants or make my own curtains… actually make them myself and not have to depend on buying them, I can just make stuff out of scraps. So I really like that, being able to create things. [Pamelia] Several women connected their views and values to university classes they had taken on issues of feminism, politics, or media awareness, or to academic internship experiences. I had an internship at a pro-choice organization… I became really passionate about pro-choice issues and access to abortion and feminism in general… it was a real shift in mentality, even though I was raised by fairly liberal parents, but just to go from liberal to progressive was a jump. I also caught fat acceptance when I
199 was coming to feminism in general, and I think that helped to sweep me along. [Tali] Several women were involved in activism and educating others regarding their beliefs, including presenting body acceptance workshops and other educational activities. An alternative menstrual booth. So I started doing lots of research into tampons and pads and just understanding it more, it’s just like a capitalist venture off women’s cycles essentially. I was the one that kind of put the board together and did all the research and presentation for it. [Ostara] 5.4.2. Communities of Resistance and Joy. Several women created communities through social action as a reflection of their critical political consciousness, resistance to any external gaze, and embracing of joy. In contrast to generally supportive social environments previously addressed in Chapter 4, these purposefully resistive social groups were explicitly focused on resistance to external gaze-based social norms around the body. This shared stance of resistance involved connecting to others with shared values of embracing and loving one’s body as it is, engagement in joyful body experiences, and a focus on shared resistance to body, diet, and food preoccupation. Working on a Fat Zine is a joyful body experience because it’s me celebrating with people that I care about my body, the fat acceptance culture, and sharing it. Me reflecting back on myself that having joyful body experiences are okay in my body size because there are instances where I wonder, is that okay for me to be happy with my size? Because in the mainstream that’s not considered acceptable. So researching and writing for that, and just simply sharing it with other people and saying this is what I’m doing and why is marvellous. [Ophelia] Many women found community in alternative social groups as well as space to reinforce their alternative perspectives.
200 Being if not on the periphery, then involved in a lot of different alternative scenes. Being vegetarian, involved in that community. Being involved in the anarchist community. Being involved in the queer community. Being involved in communities that are already questioning and are already dissenting, can help you to question and challenge other things. I think my cohorts, the people that I’ve aligned myself with, have helped me a lot to maintain that, to maintain confidence in my decisions, in my behaviour. [Ophelia] Several women spoke about friends leading them to an alternative perspective or to alternative social activities. I watched the Vagina Monologues [laughter] and I loved it. Yeah, a couple of friends were actually in it as well and they encouraged me to come out. It was a really good experience just connecting with different women doing things, different levels of wanting to share different aspects of either sexuality or personal experiences. [Judy] Many women found that friendship groups encouraged their developing environmental, political, and body accepting beliefs, and were an essential element in their resistance of dominant messages regarding their bodies and activities and embracing of joyful ways of being in their bodies. Friends that are like, “yeah, I like the way that I look and I am totally fine with that.” I would be like “yeah, I should too. I need to get on that.” …. Those values were easy to fall into because it was supported by this really sound group. So not shaving my legs it was like, “yeah, nobody shaves their legs. Nobody shaves their pubic hair. Yeah, we’ll all go swimming naked…” My one friend didn’t wear makeup at all but was very much connected to her sexuality and ensuring that she always had an orgasm. I hadn’t had an orgasm at the time… I looked up to her in that regard of discovering what that meant for me and talking to her a lot about that… I had always felt things but suddenly found people that agreed with them… Those relationships had a huge influence on my personality and the way that I treated myself because the way they treated themselves seemed much more
201 respectful… it also relates to who I spend romantic time with as well. It was very much only people who were going to respect my body. [Ostara] Almost all participants noted the importance of current and ongoing resistive peer environments, and the recursive nature of resistance in these communities, whereby these women sought out communities and communities re-enforced their critical perspective. When I think about friends, I generally find myself surrounded by either fat friends, who are also like, “hey, fat bodies are cool” [laughing]. And really gorgeous. And people who are really open about that. And also working in the disabled community, you get a lot of different appreciations for the body and what it expels [laughing]. You know, being okay with the fact that some people have a lot of gas, some people vomit a lot. Some people just have different body experiences… I interact with those people every single day. So it’s just so normal for me. And so my body experiences and my relationships, I think because of the work I do, it’s just fundamental, I’m going to be in relationships with people that are okay with different body experiences. [Ophelia] Almost all of the women enjoyed focusing their social time and energy on volunteer groups, political groups, online communities, and community groups. They described these communities as essential in their resistance to diet pressures and to an alternative focus on engagement in joyful body experiences. I was coming into feminism then, pro-choice activism and feminism and different kinds of progressive action and reading alternative media and blogging.… I don’t know if I ever could have done this before the Internet, either. Not only because I found those resources… in my first full year or so of fat acceptance, I was blogging pretty intensely about my experience with it and just getting my thoughts out… I was saying things other people were agreeing with was really helpful in having some affirmation that way. It was building a community when I didn't have a physical one… when I first met [internet-based fat acceptance group] we went out for ice cream, it was amazing. It was like the Internet was
202 coming to life in front of me, off my screen. ’Cause I had never met anyone else in person who was fat accepting and all of a sudden there was 12 fat women eating ice cream in a park. [Tali] In the focus group, women spoke about seeking community and their desire for, and sometimes lack of, resistive communities. Gemma: So I’ll do things with all these different people, but… Tali: It’s hard to find people that really work for you and work with you. Gemma: Yes. Even in those communities I find that I’m on the edge of some and edge of the other… Kalli: I don’t feel like I fit exactly with any particular community either and I’m okay with that. Because of the way I am, it’s very hard for me to find this core group that I identify with. Women also spoke about the importance of utilizing joyful body experiences to generate connections to a broader sense of community, particularly connecting with others who they perceived as marginalized. Finding and building relationships, even if it’s just smiling and waving to an old woman across the road because she’s also huffing and puffing as we’re making it up this hill. And saying, hey, I know [laughing] I’m huffing. Yeah, it’s connecting with people hands down. And, when I’m biking, that’s what I’m doing. [Ophelia] This concludes the results regarding the fourth theme within Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze, namely, Critical Political Consciousness. This theme included the sub-themes of Embracing Alternative Values and Communities of Resistance and Joy.
Summary
203 Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze addressed the ways in which women negotiated others’ gaze by resisting external pressure to be harshly judgemental of their bodies. This chapter demonstrated the components of women’s joyful body experiences whereby they chose to resist constraints, limitations, and barriers in order to enable themselves to enact joyful experiences. Women negotiated their engagement in joyful experiences and embraced themselves in the context of ongoing interactions that attempted to create a focus on others’ gaze to the exclusion of women’s own sense of embodiment. The women in this study deconstructed and disengaged from media messages that were harshly judgemental of women’s bodies, encouraging body, weight, and shape preoccupation. Women experienced the detrimental impact of others’ gaze, whether as a result of strangers’ uninvited comments, cultural constraints, or unwelcome commentaries by friends or family members that critiqued either the body of the person commenting, or study participants’ bodies. The imposition of others’ external gaze adversely impacted the women’s own experiences of themselves and their joyful body activities, as well as at times disrupting women’s social interactions with parents, friends, or co-workers. These women enacted overt resistance by rejecting expectations regarding feminine behaviour and beauty practices, particularly those practices related to dieting, beauty, clothing, cosmetics, and hair. Women rejected the harshly judgemental gaze of others and refused to engage in practices that dictated that joy in their body be contingent on adhering to external expectations of their body size or shape. They were critical of issues of oppression and social justice, particularly those related to the body, and embraced their own values and politics around the body—a stance that was supported by resistance within their social groups.
204 Ultimately, the women in the present study were able to resist and attend sufficiently to their own comfort with themselves and to their desire to engage in joyful activities, in a manner that was not conditional on meeting others’ expectations or beholden to others’ external gaze.
Chapter Six - Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy The current chapter addresses study participants’ enactment of joy within the context of resistance and struggle, and is related to Chapter 5. However, this chapter focuses on women’s journey to joy through connecting with themselves within an adverse culture. Rather than engage in constant struggle to reduce body size, change body shape, and adhere to norms of beauty and femininity, the women strove to embrace themselves and their bodies. However, women experienced shifts throughout their lives in relation to embodied experiences of joy. Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy includes the themes of Reclaimed Childhood Experiences, Disruption and Reconnection, and Guiding Other Girls and Women (see Figure 13 for a delineation of the themes in Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy). Figure 13. Themes within the core dimension of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy.
Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy
Reclaimed Childhood Experiences
Disruption and Reconnection
Guiding Other Girls and Women
6.1. Reclaimed Childhood Experiences For almost all of the women in the study, a sense of connection to their childhood self was important in shaping their joyful body experiences, and an element of their journey involved 205
206 recapturing the sense of joy they had in childhood. Most often, the women experienced childhood as a time without struggle regarding their joyful body experiences. Women either disconnected from their bodies and re-connected to themselves as adults, or maintained a positive connection with their bodies throughout their lives. However, few of the women also experienced freedom as adults in contrast to a childhood frequently filled with parentally imposed restrictions. Regardless, all participants had memories of joyful body experiences in childhood. These memories were easily accessible to them as adults, and gave them a reference point for their present day experiences of joy in their bodies, including activities that they remembered joyfully engaging in as children. They often continued to joyfully engage in these activities as adults, as Nimco noted, “that is what I used to do when I was a kid. It’s funny, now that I have grown I still go back to what I used to do when I was younger, being outdoors.” Indeed, for many women, the most prominent memories of joyful body experiences during childhood involved the outdoors and the sense of freedom and enjoyment they experienced there. Swimming. I was a fish when I was a kid, absolutely loved whether it was a pool, a lake, I didn’t care. And I would spend hours… That was probably my earliest, really happy kid stuff, was just feeling like I could move and do anything. [Jade] In the present day, many women continued to engage in the same activities they enjoyed as children, often enjoying these activities on a daily basis. Krishna noted, “I’ve biked basically as long as I can remember… My dad’s pretty active. So he… taught me how to bike.” Being active and outdoors with family members was a common joyful childhood experience. Ostara described her socioeconomic status as a child as poor. I just was always into making forts in the backyard and climbing trees because my mother and I would always spend lots of time in nature together. She would
207 always take me on walks in parks and the forest and I just loved doing that the most… we always had a garden that I would play with worms in and roll in dirt in the flower-bed. I liked doing those things and I felt secure and they were always just very positive things I would do with my family… now I still do similar things with my family and I enjoy them the most. It’s neat that it is a whole lifelong thing. [Ostara] Other recurring stories of memories of joyful childhood experiences included those that were focused on fun, playful activities, and enjoyment of family connections. I used to ask my mom and my dad to tickle me. So they would literally just put me on my back and tickle the crap out of me… And they used to zerbert my belly, which I also used to love. So just that laughter and feeling all those tickles, used to make me feel pretty great to be in my body [laughter]. [Radha] For some women their adult comfort with food involved rituals from their home culture or childhood that were formative and were associated with a sense of belongingness, rootedness, and cherishing their history in positive ways. This was the case for Nimco, whose working class family emigrated from East Africa when she was a child. Food was something that everybody did and it was a fun thing. It was seen as a positive. I think my mother always made it positive. On a Sunday we would make some special meal together and we would all eat together. Also, when we were younger we ate communal… All of the food would be all poured out on one plate and we would eat together… My mother always made sure the smaller ones who didn’t eat as quick as the older ones had different plates so the older ones didn’t all eat all of your food [laughter]. I think it is that value at the house in relation to if you see food as positive. I don’t think there are too many of my siblings who see food as an evil thing to do. It’s something you eat and it’s fun. [Nimco] Several women shared experiences of rebelling against parental expectations as children, an expression of independence that continued into adulthood.
208 Even as a kid when my mom tried to put me in a dress I didn’t like, I was like, “no.” She would tell me stories about when I was younger, really younger and she’d give me a bath and they’d dress me up in clothes and take me to the nursery and the nursery was kilometres away. If I didn’t want to go to the nursery, then I’d just sneak out… Just walk all the way back home. If I didn't have clothes I liked, then I’d… put on clothes I liked. So it’s something that was there when I was a kid and it just kinda went on and on and on as I got older. [Krishna] Other women also noted a long standing rejection of the trappings of femininity beginning in childhood and continuing into the present day. When I was younger there was a lot of pressure from my mother and my grandmother for me to look like a girl and wear dresses and act like a girl and I really hated that. So I think I began that rebelliousness when I was younger… They were always like, “oh you should play with Barbies,” but I really liked Tonka cars and playing with racing cars and climbing trees. I thought Barbies looked disgusting and smelled and felt disgusting. The whole experience of them made me vomit… I was just never interested in that. I never got into that subculture of playing into body image so young. [Ostara] A few women experienced restrictions as children whereby they wanted to be involved in the world rather than feeling trapped at home, including Gemma who as a child emigrated from Asia with her working class, traditional, and religious family. I grew up in a religious household. We were [small religious sect] and we weren’t allowed to do anything… Under a restrictive environment you have to be creative… Because I grew up in what I felt was a harsh environment, as soon as I graduated from high school that was my ticket to freedom… It was all school, school, school, school, school. I just couldn’t wait to be out of there. So that’s what I did… I can’t be in a classroom all the time. The world is my classroom… I learn out in the field. I’m happy. Just let me loose. [Gemma]
209 At times, changes in women’s lives resulted in changes in their needs from childhood to adulthood, as described by Nimco who was raised in a large family. She described her sexual orientation as heterosexual. She is married to a man and has children. I grew up in a very large family and a very communal environment. To do a lot of solo activities hasn’t been necessarily part of my repertoire of things that I do at all. It has changed recently though since I’ve had children. I am more now looking forward to just reading a book on my own and not having the children around. I didn’t crave it as much when I was younger but now I think that I have more needs to be by myself than I did before. [Nimco] Though some of the women experienced periods of disruption and disconnection from joyful body experiences, often their connection to their childhood self was a touchstone through which they were able to re-engage with themselves in a joyful capacity as adults. Zena referred to watching a video of her self that was taken when she was a child. Movement for me was about not feeling restricted… my dad took a video… of me dancing… I was kind of the ingénue… You know what? Ten-year-old Zena would have said, “fuck you.” I'm having a good time. I love my body and I am the hottest thing since sliced bread. She had no problems with confidence… if I can’t take that kind of joy and apply it to things that I do now without fear and without judgment, than I can’t really celebrate my body in the way that comes naturally to me. [Zena] This concludes the results regarding the first theme of Reclaimed Childhood Experiences within the chapter Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy. 6.2. Disruption and Reconnection Women maintained acceptance of their bodies or overcame a past of disrupted, appearance-focused body experiences in order to shift into their present state of being connected to an embodied space of self-acceptance and focusing on joy. Regarding her shift from a focus
210 on body dissatisfaction to a focus on connection to joyful body experiences, Ophelia stated, “it’s an awakening. Your consciousness shifts and your perspective shifts, or mine did.” This experience was described as transformative by Tali during the focus group, “I feel almost like I’ve had a rebirth.” When she began engaging in the joyful body experience of writing, Zena stated, “I found myself again.” The majority of participants did not experience profound shifts related to bodily disruption and reconnection, rather they experienced joy continually, maintaining it throughout their lives. Others had short but significant phases, typically a year or more during adolescence, when they became highly body- and appearance-conscious while engaged in activities intended to alter their body or appearance. They then shifted away from those body-altering activities and re-connected with themselves and their bodies. Several participants made a decision to reconnect with their bodies as a result of recognizing that their body changing efforts were ineffective. I was more muscular than the average person. There was the decision to own it, because it didn’t matter how much I exercised, I used to go to the gym and I used to run and I used to try all these different things and skip and all that and my body looks exactly the same, just maybe a little toned or less, but it looks exactly the same. In fact, my weight has barely fluctuated over the decades. [Kalli] The few women who had dieted also made a decision to embrace themselves, including Tali, who had engaged in dieting behaviour for many years. Tali initially ceased dieting for a short time, as a break from dieting behaviour; however, ultimately she rejected dieting completely. I started to gain weight back while I was still dieting. That was sort of a red flag… this is what I’m going to do my whole life. I’m going to lose weight and then I’m going to just do whatever I want for a while and then I’m going to lose weight again… I liked getting compliments and I liked people saying, “Oh, you're
211 looking so thin…” I’ve always been an over-achiever… it was just I wanted to be good at this, too. So it was maybe maturing to the point that I could let go of a little bit of that measure of control and realize that it didn’t make me any less of a success if I couldn't control my body and get it into this little mould that I wanted to fit in… seeing that there were other people who were really smart and really articulate and had really put a lot of thought into this and said, “why are we doing this?”… I went into that summer, decided not to diet, and I didn’t. But I wasn’t committed to not dieting forever… Clearly my body was clawing weight back on itself when I was being extreme, so why don’t I just see what happens. [Tali] Women also noted the challenges involved in shifting into a body-accepting framework. As Tali noted, “I realized very quickly that it’s actually harder not to diet than it is to diet… you’ll find all the support you want everywhere and you’ll just do it. And to not do it is harder.” Several women noted that they had a series of different types of phases of disruption and reconnection, often occurring during adolescence. The whole phase with me being girlie, that was a significant phase. I’d say about two years, a lot longer than most other negative phases… Every time I walked by a mirror, “is my hair in the right spot?” and I drove myself crazy… They enrolled me into karate and that became my focus… I was more interested in my skill, my abilities, not so much about how I looked. At that point I did rebel against all my fussiness. I shaved my head. [Kalli] In the focus group, while women completely rejected striving for image-based body changes, they mentioned occasionally experiencing limited temporary disruptions. They noted that the experiences of reconnection occurred as a result of their engagement in joyful body activities. Kalli: If I go through a Vogue I’d think oh I wish my eyelashes were like that… I can catch myself saying these things and then it’s like why do I really care? So the only thing that draws me back and grounds me is the activities I enjoy doing, the joyful experience I get that actually brings it back and all that stuff doesn’t matter
212 because I’m still happy doing my own thing. So I think maybe we're all susceptible to be influenced by that, but we have something to come back to, your photography and things you enjoy doing, whereas I think if people are just doing their whatever nine-to-five job that they don’t find a lot of happiness from, maybe they’re in a relationship, they’re not happy and there are all these things that they don’t find they’re really enjoying and then they have those messages on top of that. Then they feel like there’s something wrong with them. I’m not happy, maybe it’s because I don’t look like that… it’s easier to deal with “if I lost weight then I could be like this” versus “I should get another job” [laughter]. Tali: I think it’s absolutely easier to be like “whatever problems I have, if I just become this certain way, if I wear this makeup or wear this size then it will be easier.” Kalli: Temporary happiness versus having to deal with some bigger issues. Tali: Yes. And then you get to that size and realize I’m exactly the same as I was before I started [laughter]… I was never satisfied and then I hit the magic number and I was still not satisfied and everything else was so great and I was like wow, I’m wasting all this energy and time trying to control something that’s really not controllable. For some women, particularly those with larger bodies, navigating disruption and reconnection was at times experienced through wondering whether it is truly acceptable for them to be body-accepting. Ophelia described her body type as fat, pear-shaped, and big breasted, and she stated, “I think I just always felt unsure, like, where do I fit in this? Not knowing if being okay with my body was okay.” A shift into a focus on inner experiences rather than a focus on appearance and body size applied both to larger women and to thin women, though some women in this study noted the privilege that accompanied being thin while enacting this shift. Ann described her body type as petite, curvy, shapely, fit, and short.
213 It was easy to get away with socially at the time because I was thin… but on the other hand it’s hard because you put your own mental roadblocks up and tell yourself that you have to be this weight or you have to fit into this outfit. [Ann] All of the women who experienced a shift from disruption to reconnection were able to identify when the shift happened and how it progressed. When I was a young girl I felt really insecure because I got teased a lot for having [genetic health condition that leads to some alteration of appearance and perceptual difficulties]… when I was in Grade 8 I had really long hair and I was really about, oh, I am going to be so sexy, and I am going to fulfil that ideal of womanhood… then when I was in high school I got into wearing makeup… Being in the dance culture, too… it’s always a competition of body image as well like who looks the best on stage? Who is the most fit? Who is the best dancer?… totally pushing myself to overcome things. I feel like it was really hard initially but since then it has been a really easy snowball [laughter]… I just wanted to feel better and more secure and more sound… That is when I started getting really into, body products are disgusting, why do women wear all of these body products? Why do women have to meet this ideal image? And the beginnings of feminism were kind of sprouting in me.… related to environmentalism… so I said, okay, well I am going to stop wearing makeup… and that is going to be my first step of being like, my body is fine the way it is. So that was the first thing I did for myself. [Ostara] Several women attributed their shifts to feminism. Having a bit of a framework, especially Audre Lorde at that age, really blew my mind. And it really helped me articulate a lot of the things that I was feeling. And I had this teacher who understood literature and understood feminist literature fairly well, and so I was able to have guided discussions along with it.… Gloria Steinem, The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolfe… Alice Walker. [Radha] Other women were impacted both by feminism and also by other alternative sub-cultures.
214 I read a lot and for the first time I started getting exposed to literature on feminism and philosophy. So I started getting really into that, and I think that’s how I started developing a sense of comfort with myself and just not caring what other people thought. And then a lot of the rock music I listen to, it’s not caring what people think… it opened up my mind to thinking about myself and who I was and how I let society influence my thoughts… people would still make comments about how I was dressed, or how my hair was, but I didn’t really care at that point anymore… I had the shift where I’m not even going to bother trying to please people… my confidence has just gotten shhew really high up since then… I just became very comfortable with myself. [Ann] Several women saw physical activity as being linked to their shift away from appearance focus. Tali, who identified her socioeconomic status as a child and youth as upper middle class, noted, “I think that probably being an athlete had something to do with it… I did learn to privilege what my body could do rather than what it looked like.” Other participants realized that their body worries were actually connected to internal concerns. They were able to separate their internal concerns from their external appearance. I had gotten the idea that thin and slender and all those kinds of things are very desirous… and I was not like that… For prom, I bought this dress and it was a little too tight… So I went on this diet and I started working out… And then I got in the dress and then people took pictures of me and I looked at the pictures after and I thought I looked awful. I still was not happy with my body at all even though everybody around me was ecstatic… the stuff that was going on that needed to be fixed was not in the body… there was so much misery going on in my mental emotional state… that’s probably why now mental emotion happiness and physical happiness are absolutely inseparable for me. [Zena] A focus on their internal lives both facilitated and resulted from their shift from disconnection into reconnection. Zena spoke about working with totems during meditation in
215 order to facilitate her shift from disrupted body experience into body acceptance, within the context of living with a chronic health condition. I had a wolf that was following me around and, quite literally, he scared the shit out of me… I allowed myself to face him and realizing that he was actually basically a symbol from my [chronic health condition] and, if I didn’t take care of myself, of course my [chronic health condition] is going to get out of control and snap at me. That’s what a wolf does. I had to understand that a wolf doesn’t want to be like that. The wolf would much rather just be a wolf as opposed to being a monster, and that’s really the way that I had looked at him for a really long time, as just this horrible thing within myself that I didn’t have control over and I would never understand… when I allowed myself to be comfortable on the inside of my body, he was there. And, instead of frightening me, I was sitting on a lawn chair in my mind and he climbed up on my lap and did the circle that dogs do [laughter] and curled up with me. That was when I could actually mark how comfortable I had become with my body, because I had become so comfortable with the wolf and that’s what he represented to me… this is what your physical being is right now, and if I am calm, then he will be calm… It was so powerful. [Zena] This concludes the results regarding the second theme of Disruption and Reconnection within the chapter Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy. 6.3. Guiding Other Girls and Women Study participants shared a number of thoughts, ideas, and reflections regarding how to support girls and other women in their own journeys towards self-acceptance, and towards developing the capacity for joyful body experiences while rejecting mainstream ideals of body, weight, and food preoccupation. The final theme in this chapter addresses women’s reflections upon their own journey and thoughts on their own processes of subverting the external gaze in order to attain joy, with acknowledgement that the women’s reflections on their experiences as a part of this study are an element of the women’s journey as well. The women believed that, for
216 girls, a focus on their experiences rather than on their appearance is essential. The women agreed that an important element of supporting girls in developing their capacity for joyful body experiences is the opportunity for girls to explore and try different fun activities in order to define themselves for who they are, build confidence, and focus on their own accomplishments and interests, rather than on others’ gaze. Kalli emphasized, “Any sort of activities where they find joy in doing something. And doing something can be anything from art to dance or whatever, and I think it all involves your body.” The women in this study proposed the importance of a focus on developing girls’ capacity for critical thinking through structured education, including feminist content on media literacy and sexual education. The women also commented on the relevance of girls receiving normalizing messages regarding different bodies, experiences, and romantic relationships. All women noted the importance of role models for girls, with Jade stating, “dialogue, and at a young age deconstructing how it is that people feel and why it is that people feel a particular way when they eat, when they run, when they’re taking a bath.” Women commented that parents need to support their children with activity options, and parents must also have worked on their own self-esteem in order to role model positive relationships with food to their daughters. The women in this study also agreed that a change in the media would benefit young girls, ideally with realistic representations of the bodies and experiences of both girls and women, as well as reduced media access, and acknowledgement that media is harmful. The necessity of safe spaces for girls and the benefits of encouraging girls to connect with other girls were addressed repeatedly. Anything that lets girls feel comfortable, part of the group, accepted, in a way that’s not focused on how they look… Let them find what they’re interested in… they can just figure out who they are… giving kids an opportunity to explore themselves in a safe way. For them to take risks and fail at things and realize that
217 it’s not that big of a deal to fail at a few things and then figure out what they are good at and what they like doing. [Pamelia] With regards to adult women, participants agreed that it is much more difficult to change ingrained and problematic beliefs in adults. I don’t want to say it’s too late to help adult women, but I think it’s hard when a lot of them have grown up and gotten married and had children in this social framework and they have all these attachments and relationships with people who are still entrenched in it. I think it’s really hard for them to sever that. [Ann] The women in this study recognized the importance of adult women having access to fun activities that are not appearance based, but that reflect the women’s interests and passions. However, they also acknowledged that there were difficulties for many women related to the costs of these activities, as well as difficulties due to adults’ lack of time and lack of access to group activities. Opportunities to join different teams and clubs and that kind of thing. I don’t think that it’s as easy for adult women who are not involved in a school or a church or something to actually join a group. It would be really great if there were just more of them… making more opportunities for people to join things and free things would be great. [Tali] Rejection of media images, as well as the necessity of alternative examples of beauty and success, and media literacy regarding advertising, were regarded as essential for adult women to begin shifting away from body striving and into joyfulness. Participants commented on the importance of peer groups, with the need for opportunities for women to consciously socialize with other people who share the women’s passions, while also offering support in rejecting mainstream culture and rejecting the belief that joyful body experiences should be contingent on achieving a particular appearance.
218 I think making friends with people who support them just feeling good the way they are. Being in a group of people who view things that way and they don’t support or enact or make comments based on this mainstream media culture of body image. [Ostara] As a route to achieving these goals, women proposed increased dialogue with other women whereby space would be opened for conversations regarding joyful body experiences. There is not a lot of dialogue and discussion, there is none actually, about what positive, joyful body experience is. I don’t know if I or other women would be able to identify it when we’re actually experiencing it. And the reason why is it’s just not even on our radar, unfortunately. [Radha] The strengths and struggles of all women around the world, from varying social locations, were framed as important. Attentiveness to similarities and differences in women’s experiences across cultures was noted as being important. If we could engage in dialogue with all of the diverse communities… what are the positive experiences of embodiment and supporting and nurturing young women? And also how we can also work to address problematic attitudes and customs… Not just to be more inclusive, but we don’t have all the answers in Canada, so there is a lot to learn from other cultures and practices, as well as addressing some of the problems that are systemic worldwide. [Radha] This concludes the results regarding the chapter Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy. This chapter included the themes Reclaimed Childhood Experiences, Disruption and Reconnection, and Guiding Other Girls and Women. Summary This chapter focused on women’s journey to joy. These women’s varied journeys to joy ultimately resulted in them claiming or reclaiming themselves through their attention to body connection while engaged in resistance to broader cultural expectations, particularly concern
219 regarding appearance, weight, or size preoccupation. An important element of claiming or reclaiming themselves was women’s connection to their childhood self and their reconnection with joyful body activities they had engaged in as children. Additionally, this journey to joy addressed women’s contentment with themselves, which was maintained over time, or developed as women overcame a past history of dieting and appearance-focus in order to shift into their current state of joyful focus. Women also shared ideas regarding how to encourage girls and other women to claim themselves and enable themselves to resist beauty pressures, while directing energy towards engagement in joyful body activities.
Chapter Seven - Discussion The current study is the first of its kind to examine women’s embodied experiences of joy utilizing a feminist, socially critical lens. A qualitative, constructivist approach led to the emergence of core dimensions in joyful body experiences among the thirteen women participants, as described in both individual interviews and a focus group. With regards to the findings of the present research, the primary findings and key elements will be addressed in more detail throughout this discussion. However, a brief overview is as follows: First, this research responds to calls to address women’s lives and women’s own lived experiences; second, this study bridges previously unresearched connections between joy, body experiences, and resistance; third, previous research has not conceptualized the multidimensionality of joy that emerged in the findings of the present study; fourth, the present study found evidence to support a variety of areas of research and feminist theories, as well as disputing elements of previous conceptualizations of joy and body experience; fifth, this study found that women utilized their own sense of agency with regards to their joyful embodied experiences, which is an important element of individual experiences. However, shifts in women’s body experiences also require broader social change, as enacted by the women in this study through, for example, media creation and resistive social groups. 7.1. The Multidimensional Nature of Joyful Body Experiences The first finding of the current study is that joyful body experiences were comprised of four core dimensions. Within those core dimensions, several themes and sub-themes emerged. To date, there has been no previous research on the multidimensional components of joyful body experiences. The results of the current study suggest the complexity of the experience of embodied joy. Joyful body experiences are comprised of four core dimensions: the experience of embodied joy; the creation by women of environments that nurture joy; enacting joy in the
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221 context of resistance and struggle through navigating the imposition of another’s external gaze; and enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle through one’s journey to joy. In contrast with the present investigation, previous research has tended to focus on only one element of either joy, body experiences, or resistance, and much of the previous work in each of these areas has been theoretical in nature. The current study contributes to the research literature by responding to the call to engage in research on women’s body experiences and practical lives (Bordo, 1997; Young, 2005). The present study is particularly important, as feminist theorists have noted that attention to praxis, the practical experience of bodies, is missing from research on women’s bodies. Embodiment must be understood particularly with regards to lived experiences bridging the personal and the political realities of living in a patriarchal, capitalist society (Bordo, 1997; Oakley, 1981; Young, 2005). Feminist writers have also criticized the failure of research to account for women’s body practices, or to provide evidence to support theoretical suggestions for improving women’s body experiences (Bordo, 1997; Szekely, 1988). Other authors have suggested that research with women must endeavour to understand how women’s daily lived experience is constituted, and must name and describe bodily experiences in order to recognize that knowledge requires the interaction of bodies with broader power systems (Grosz, 1993; Szekely, 1988). Feminist psychology has been critiqued for neglecting to acknowledge the ways in which women’s bodies do not passively respond to psychological influences (Birke, 1999; Davis, 1997; Diprose, 1994; Lyons & Barbalet, 1994; Szekely, 1988). Another criticism of psychological research in general is related to the overwhelming emphasis on negative experiences (Csikszentmihalyi, 2006; DickNiederhauser, 2009; Fredrickson, 2006; Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). The current study responds to the preceding critiques by: discovering the meaning of joyful embodiment for the study’s participants; accounting for women’s body practices through
222 research; and providing empirical evidence to support previous theoretical suggestions for improving women’s body experiences. The current study describes specific ways in which women’s experiences in their bodies reflect agency and a capacity to repossess their bodies (Davis & Fisher, 1993; Rich, 1976; Weiss & Haber, 1999). Interviewing women and having them recount their life experiences enabled the researcher to gain an understanding of the participants’ lives, and how those experiences bridged both personal and political realities. Additionally, this study attends to the praxis, or the practical experience of bodies (Bordo, 1997). The current study also contributes to the growing literature on positive experiences and positive emotions—particularly joy. Additionally, the present study found that the participants were active agents in creating and nurturing experiences of joy, and in resisting environmental influences that had the potential to disrupt their experiences of joy. Given the challenges women face, of attending to their bodily needs without following cultural dictates of thinness and appearance, these research participants practiced what feminist theory has described as lacking from the discourse on women’s bodies by inhabiting their bodies from a place of resistance to feminine norms (Davis, 1997; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Szekely, 1988). The current study responded to the call for a deepened understandings of women’s daily lived experiences, and contributes to the research literature, by studying women’s daily lived experiences, by naming and describing women’s body experience, and by acknowledging the interaction between women’s bodies and their world. The overall findings of the current study, and even the process of interviewing, are in line with Fryett’s (2011) dissertation on liminal laughter. Liminal laughter is described by Fryett as a feminist practice, created in the margins and involving critical engagement; it is “an alternative practice of resistance rooted in the body” (p. 1). This laughter is a practice, focused on the body’s
223 senses, whereby dualism is “torn asunder” (p. 17). In the present investigation, not only were the women’s narratives reflective of embodied resistance, the interviews themselves were marked by frequent laughter. As such, participants’ embodied resistance was represented through selfreports of their own experiences, and also as an element of the research process itself. Another study, which included self-reported daily experiences of the duration of joyful feelings, found that joy was prolonged when cognitions were related to the emotional experience of joy, and when social sharing occurred (Verduyn, Van Mechelen, & Tuerlinckx, 2011). The current research study in and of its self achieved both thoughts related to joy and also social sharing, thus further re-enforcing participants’ joyful experiences. With regards to research that generally addresses joyful embodiment, participants in the current study were deeply connected to their feelings of well-being; feeling good was linked at times to, but was by no means dependant on, physical proficiency. Additionally, each of the women in the present study viewed themselves positively. This contrasts with Kennedy’s (1994) qualitative dissertation research exploring positive body image. In Kennedy’s study, participants’ experience of feeling good was based on physical proficiency through faster times in exercise training. As well, Kennedy’s participants struggled to be aware of specific details of the feeling of well-being and instead described their experience as one of tacit awareness. Kennedy noted that body image and self were connected, however, participants’ view of themselves was not necessarily positive. The discrepancies between Kennedy’s research and the present study may be attributed to the difference between studying body image, and studying experiences of embodiment and the specific impacts of joyful embodiment. The emergent four core dimensions of embodied joy found in this study are in accordance with key elements of the Health at Every Size (HAES) model, whereby participants engaged in body acceptance, intuitive eating behaviour, and activity. They accessed social support regarding
224 their resistive perspective, thereby leading full lives regardless of their Body Mass Index (BMI) (Bacon et al., 2005). Recently, Piran and Teall (2012) provided the first research-based clarification of the construct of embodiment. They accomplished this by utilizing two qualitative research programs involving 117 interviews, and translating themes that emerged into a quantitative scale. Their Developmental Theory of Embodiment determined that Positive/Connected Embodiment includes: Feeling “at one” with the body, embodied power and agency, body functionality/competence, a “subjective” experience of living in the body with limited external consciousness, the freedom to act/take space/move especially in private and public spheres, the freedom to challenge external standards, bodyanchored joy/passion/comfort/other positive feelings, body care and protection, clarity of needs/rights/desires/internal states, connection to others regarding needs/desires/rights, the freedom to express individuality through the body, connection with the physical environment, and the openness to use the body as a source of knowledge in interacting with the world. (Piran & Teall, 2012, p. 185) In Piran and Teall’s (2012) work, the experience of joy was determined to be an aspect of positive embodiment. However, their study did not focus specifically on the experience of joy, whereas the present study expands this research to delineate the multidimensional components of joy. The joyful embodiment women described in the current study supports Inckle’s (2007) theoretical work, in that embodiment enables engagement in experiences as lived and less objectified, with a focus on the intimacy of one’s own body. The women in the present study experienced joy in a way that feminists have considered challenging for women. For example, feminist theories that few women had a sense of bodily identity which prevents women from being at ease in the flesh or inhabiting the body (Wolf, 1991) were disputed by the present study, in which women were able to fully inhabit their bodies, and experienced ease in the flesh and in the present. Similarly, the present study supports feminist theories that women who focused on
225 appearance were unable to experience an authentic delight in their bodies, or to celebrate the diversity of women’s shape, strength, or joy (Bartky, 1990). Indeed the descriptions of bodily joy by women in the current study were free of self-consciousness regarding their appearance. 7.1.1. Experiences of Joy in the Body. The first core category of joyful body experiences addresses the findings of the present study with regards to the experience of embodied joy. In turn, this category had four themes: Attunement, Growth, Liberation, and Thriving. The present investigation therefore suggests that the experience of joy in the body is anchored in; Attunement—women’s deepened awareness and understanding of their own needs during joyful activities; Growth—learning and building towards goals as they engaged in their joyful activities; Liberation—a sense of freedom from both physical and emotional constraints, combined with pleasurable, triumphant experiences when engaged in joyful activities; and Thriving—a sense of agency and power, as well as the experience of a variety of components of the joyful activity aligning perfectly. This discussion does not delve into the complexities of joyful experiences that are linked to pain, such as childbirth. Though women did talk about joyful body experiences that involved discomfort at times, it was important that they experienced joyful embodiment that was predominately free of pain. To date, there is no similar study on the experience of joy. Indeed, researchers have highlighted that there are few studies of individuals’ experiences of joy. It has been suggested that developing an empirically grounded and experiential understanding of joy may result in greater ease in assessing what causes joy, as well as defining the function of joy (Liston, 2001; Robbins, 2006). The present research contributes towards this goal. Several writers have addressed the experience of joy as a theoretical construct. For example, positivity has been considered to include a range of experiences, such as: “joy,
226 gratitude, serenity, and interest, to hope, pride, amusement, inspiration, awe, and… love” (Fredrickson, 2009, p. 39). Joy has theoretically been described as a common, everyday emotion, which is readily accessible, with hope for the future (Kast, 1991). Fredrickson (2009) preferred the use of the term joy when conducting research about positive experiences in place of happiness, which she found to be not clearly defined and overused. However, previous research and theory has not delineated the multidimensional nature of joy. The current study found that Attunement was one component of the experience of joy in the body. With regards to Attunement, there was disagreement in the literature regarding the relevance of bodily desires and appetites to positive experiences. Some theories did not consider body pleasures (such as food, comfort, or sex) to be an expression of positive experiences. Rather, these states were conceptualized as narrowing and as related to survival, with claims that they “draw you to do exactly what your body needs at that moment… narrow your focus toward the object of your desire and help you meet a current survival need” (Fredrickson, 2009, p. 38). However, this negative view of body desires and appetites differed from the work of other theoreticians and reviewers who linked joy to desire and bodily appetites, while also noting that some of those linkages may be problematic (Liston, 2001). Indeed, a review of the most common sources of joy included the following list including, “eating, social activities and sex, exercise and sport, alcohol/drugs; success and social approval, use of skills, music/art/relation, weather/environment; rest/relaxation” (Argyle, 2001, p. 31). Others theorize that happiness involves resistance and self-determination, whereby one honours their desire at the basic level (Gore, 2010). Research and review on savouring, found that, “people have the capacities to attend to, appreciate, and enhance the positive experiences in their lives” (Bryant & Veroff, 2007, p. 2). This reflects the perspective that prior to positive experiences occurring, people must focus on attending to their experiences and have an awareness of their feelings as they are
227 occurring (Bryant & Veroff, 2007). The results of the current study do not support a theoretical position that critiques bodily pleasure as being separate from joy, given that participants included bodily pleasures as a key element of their descriptions of joyful experiences. In contrast to Fredrickson’s (2009) perspective, the present investigation does not suggest the presence of negative elements as a result of following bodily desires or needs. Rather, attunement to bodily needs was central to the experience of joy, as reflected in the first theme of Attunement. The present study outlined a sub-theme under Attunement of Trusting Oneself in the Moment, which is in line with joy as it involves the present moment and being present to the self (Kast, 1991). The results of the current study differed in some ways from the results of Robbins (2006) dialectical, hermeneutic, phenomenological study of the experience of joy in three participants. Robbins found that when joyful, the person is forgotten, and the self is immersed in an experiential world, feeling fulfilment and immersion in the present moment. With regards to these findings, the current study found that, while these women did describe immersion, this immersion was primarily embodied and the self was not necessarily forgotten; instead, a sense of immersion and engagement occurred. However, Robbins also found that experiences of joy are linked to harmony, which is another sub-theme of Attunement. The current study found that Growth was one component of the experience of joy. Such a finding is reflective of previous research, which found that at times joy was linked to those who perceived themselves as making progress towards a personal goal (Izard, 1977). In contrast, other research described joy as not being linked to achieving an instrumental task (Robbins, 2006); in the present study, women’s growth was not contingent on achievement, but was focused more on incremental progress and learning. Women in the present study experienced growth as an important element of their joyful body experiences, which is in line with Hart and Silka’s (1994) work on ropes course training, in which adventure-based learning contributed to
228 personal growth and development. The present study supported Nakamura and Csikszentmihalyi’s (2003) assertion that joyful experiences often involve activities that are rewarding. The current study found that Liberation was one component of the experience of joy. Liberation as a component of joy is in line with research and theorizing that postulates the possibility that joy may involve freedom and the capacity to rise up and see experiences from another perspective (Kast, 1991; Robbins, 2006). Indeed, freedom through joy has been theorized to undo oppressive hierarchies (Bell, 1993). A sub-theme of Liberation, Celebration, was reflective of descriptions of joy as playful and transformative (Fredrickson, 2006; Robbins, 2006). Freedom of Movement, another sub-theme of Liberation, reflected the ways that, as Freire (1994) theorized, resistance can be expressed through the rhythm of bodies. Through freedom of movement, women in the current study rejected norms of constriction postulated by feminist theorists (Bartky, 1988). To date, no study has described Liberation in particular as an aspect of the experience of joy. The theme of Liberation has been addressed in previous theoretical discussions of women’s experiences, and feminist theory has been critiqued for neglecting to address the place of the body in liberatory analysis (Bordo, 1988; Bordo, 1997). For example, the findings of this study provide direct research support to the theoretical proposition that reclaiming life-enhancing feelings regarding the body, through acceptance regardless of body size and/or colour, enables embodiment and is part of body liberation. However, in these conceptualizations, liberation is framed as a resistance to patriarchy, racism, and capitalism (Shroff, 1993). Different authors have also discussed the relationships between liberation and well-being (Bordo, 1997; Castelnuovo & Guthrie, 1998; Prilleltensky & Nelson, 2002) and the importance of feminist efforts to create positive change through liberation (Ali, 2006). Such emergent research is
229 innovative; the experiences of these women suggest Liberation as a component of the experience of joy, in addition to liberation theory being a part of resistance. However, the present study suggests Liberation in and of its self is a component of joyful body experiences. In the present study, reflecting the embodiment of emotion within joyful experiences, women’s experiences of Liberation had both emotional and body-based components; the emotional components involved the sub-themes of Celebration and Independence, and the body-based component involved a sense of physical Freedom of Movement as an element of the liberatory experiences With regards to Thriving as a component of Joyful Body Experiences, the present research is in line with work linking joy to a sense of life affirming vibrancy and supports claims that joy derives from realizing potential (Robbins, 2006; Schutz, 1967). The current research extended previous conceptualizations of joy by providing more comprehensive details regarding the multidimensional experience of joy itself, in which joyful body experiences incorporated Attunement, Growth, Liberation, and Thriving. 7.1.2. Creating Environments that Nurture Joy. The present investigation found that these women actively engaged in a process of creating spaces for themselves that enabled them to engage in embodied joy. The core dimension of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy is comprised of women actively creating environments that nurtured their experience of embodied joy: by creating space for themselves; by engaging with their own internal environments; and by engaging in supportive social relationships. When women lived joyfully, they sought agency and worked against the structures of society that strived to deny them of their sense of agency. Through creating environments that nurtured joy, the women in the present study demonstrated their agency, power, and the capacity to shift their external and internal environments in ways that met their own needs, thus requiring both an awareness of their needs and access to space that was amenable to being shifted.
230 Feminist theorists have argued that it is essential for empirical studies to address the active role that individual women play in interacting with their bodies and resisting bodily oppression by negotiating their embodied experience (Davis, 1997, Weitz, 2003). Other feminist theorists have noted the importance of women’s agency and searching for genuine positive experiences while critiquing external authorities (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Reilly, 1999). The emergence of agency in women’s descriptions of joy supports feminists’ emphasis on women’s agency in negotiating the world around them. However, there appears to be a lack of research on women’s creation of environments that nurture joy. The present study found that Space for Myself was one component of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy. Participants in the present investigation particularly highlighted the importance of Safe Space, a sub-theme within Space for Myself. In creating Safe Space, the participants chose to transform their bodies into safe spaces, or to shift their social environments (while recognizing that societal elements that created a lack of physical safety were often beyond their control). Participants also removed themselves from negative situations and enacted emotional boundaries with others. Research studies have found the experience of violation of safety to be disruptive to women’s well-being (Haskell & Randall, 1998). Similarly, feminist writers have emphasized and theorized the benefits to women of being able to choose their own experiences in safe spaces, creating safe spaces, and the importance of opening up space in which to relate non-oppressively to oneself and others, with each individual having the capacity to shift her own ideas and actions (Bell, 1993; Hill Collins, 2000; Sawicki, 1988). Individual women may enact these shifts in small ways in their own lives, and as a form of resistance to oppression through the creation of a safer space. Shifts like this occur when oppression felt in the body is altered by an individual vis-à-vis her own position within intersecting oppressions. Such shifts impact individual lived experiences, individual agency, and also change the broader
231 domination and consciousness, which in turn impact broader structures of power itself (Hill Collins, 2000). As women “push against, step away from, and shift the terms of their participation in power relations, the shape of power relations changes for everyone” (Hill Collins, 2000, p. 275). However, no study to date has examined women’s creation of safe space in relation to joy; although Robbins’s (2006) participants described themselves as experiencing joy in environments which they experienced as being safe and familiar, safety was not an element that they strove to create. The current study found that women’s diversified engagement in a variety of different joyful activities was a key component to creating spaces for themselves, which was in turn critical to their experiences of joy. As a clinical psychologist and writer, Pipher (1994) suggested that girls needed an identity based on talents and interests, rather than appearance. She further recommended that girls be supported in engaging in varied, meaningful activities. Similarly, feminists have theorized that working to achieve cultural body standards deprives women of time, energy, and money (McKinley, 2002). The women in the present study chose to allocate their resources to joyful body experiences through Frequent Diversified Engagement in activities, a sub-theme of Space for Myself. With regards to The Natural World, another subtheme of Space for Myself, the women in the current study created space for themselves by purposefully engaging in joyful activities in outdoor environments. They described taking pleasure in joyful outdoor activities, in accordance with Kelly’s (2006) description of her experience as part of an Outward-Bound wilderness group, which encouraged self-discovery, change, and growth through the solitude of natural surroundings. The current study found that Internal Environments were one component of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy. Women in this study created internal space where they gave themselves permission to renounce guilt and shame, and engage in activities that reflected their
232 desires. They did this by Reading the Body, and reflecting on the Personal Meaning and Choice found through engaging in joyful activities—all sub-themes of Internal Environments. Feminist writers have emphasized the resistance inherent to women responding to their needs without first seeking permission; for example, in order to eat, to be sexual, or to engage in shameless pursuit of pleasure (Bartky, 1988; Dews, 1984; Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Wolf, 1991). Indeed, “it is empowering for women to make decisions about their bodies and appetites that are based on their own needs” (Shroff, 1993, p. 114). Other theorists focused on the possibilities presented when shifting from pleasing others with one’s appearance to pleasing oneself through embracing one’s body and contributing to the world (Main & Kelly, 2005); this was demonstrated in the current study by women’s attentiveness to internal environments instead of focussing on their appearance. With regards to women’s internal environments, the present study also supported the presence of women’s positive experiences through journal writing and trusting the self, centring, and making decisions to keep one’s self on course (Pipher, 1994). The present study found that Social Relationships were one component of Creating Environments that Nurture Joy. In Meadows’ (1975) conceptualization of joy, he found that there is a social dimension to joy. The present study certainly reflected that, given that women attended to, and engaged in, supportive relationships with healthy role models. Similarly, freedom from social esteem needs has been noted as a pre-condition to positive experiences (Bryant & Veroff, 2007). Another study, which included self-reported daily experiences of the duration of joyful feelings, found that joy was prolonged when social sharing occurred (Verduyn et al., 2011). The present study also supported feminist theorizing regarding the importance of discussing body issues with role models who are accepting of the self and critical of societal messages (Bohart & Tallman, 1999). Indeed, positive relationships with others are routinely noted as an element of psychological well-being (Reis & Gable, 2003).
233 7.1.3. Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze. Findings of the current study indicated that these women experienced struggles and enacted resistance to pressures they experienced in the world—namely physical, social, and power-based pressures that related to women’s bodies and their bodily experiences. These women resisted pressures regarding what uses women’s bodies are intended for, and how they are created to be acceptable. Their resistance to body striving and expectations involved working against the prejudices of what an ideal woman should be: not joyful, not assertive, and not loud. Through resistance, these women also experienced disruptions and mixed experiences with their bodies; however, the essential element that enabled the women in this study to experience joy was not lost, as it has been for many women. Although the women in this study described not being completely free of the evaluative gaze of others, they were generally engaged in a process that was not controlled by the external gaze of others. In light of their struggle to engage with their bodies while also being engaged with society, they were still able to adopt discourses on their bodies within their context—or to change their context. Women enacted joy within the context of resistance and struggle whereby they navigated the imposition of another’s external gaze; this core dimension of joyful body experiences is comprised of women engaging in media deconstruction, disengaging from problematic relationships, negotiating their own personal practices regarding beauty and weight, and engaging in a critical political consciousness geared towards resistance. Each of these four themes is interwoven with elements of resistance. Feminist theorists have proposed a series of revolutionary acts women can engage in as a means of rejecting cultural expectations of bodily dissatisfaction in order to reclaim their bodies, including: discontinuing dieting behaviour, not making themselves over in another’s image; not feeling self-contempt; learning cultural analysis vis-à-vis women’s oppression; struggling with
234 questions collectively; and seeking support from teachers, therapists, friends, or a group in enacting bodily practices of resistance (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; McKinley, 2002; Reilly, 1999; Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991). The results of the present study provide empirical support for those theoretical propositions, given that the women in the present study did not engage in dieting, rejected other’s images of them selves as primary, rejected self-contempt, engaged in cultural analysis regarding women’s oppression, and sought support from communities of resistance. According to Hill Collins (2000), while the costs of oppression and resistance must be acknowledged, it is important to portray women, particularly Black women, as having the capacity to create change in their lives. Hill Collins has argued for empowerment, as the world is, a dynamic place where the goal is not merely to survive or to fit in or to cope; rather, it becomes a place where we feel ownership and accountability… there is always choice, and power to act, no matter how bleak the situation may appear to be. Viewing the world as one in the making raises the issue of individual responsibility for bringing about change. It also shows that while individual empowerment is key, only collective action can effectively generate the lasting institutional transformation required for social justice. (p. 290) Lorentzen’s (2008) study of resistance to medical power indicated that embodied experiential knowledge represented a resource that enabled participants to resist. The results of the present study also support the proposition that participants’ embodied experiential knowledge supported their resistance, and that resistance also enabled participants to engage in embodied joyful activities. With regards to the sub-theme of Media Deconstruction and the current literature on women’s navigation of the external gaze in order to enact joy in their bodies, the majority of this literature is theoretical. However, there is substantial research on the negative impact of media images on women, and the impact of internalized self-objectification on women (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994; Fredrickson et al., 1988; Harrison & Fredrickson, 2003; Levine & Smolak,
235 2002; McKinley, 2002; Quinn et al., 2006; Thompson, 1994; Waller & Shaw, 1994). In Harrison and Fredrickson’s (2003) study of women’s sports media, they found that chronic selfobjectification among teenaged girls exposed to media is linked to body shame, depression, and disordered eating. Harrison and Fredrickson’s (2003) work was supported by comments made by participants during the present study that even sports media has been problematic for them. There are also theoretical discussions of the negative impact of media images on women, focusing on the damage caused by an unrealistic media ideal regarding body size, appetite control, and bodily mastery. There is ample theorizing that media images need to be more diverse; it needs to base women’s worth in their actions, with a focus on the potential positive impact of women questioning media messages (Bordo, 1997; Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994; Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991). Research has examined the negative impact of the evaluative gaze, however, there is little research regarding how women resist this evaluative gaze and negotiate it with agency; this gap is addressed by the findings of the current research. In the present study, women reported having experienced and observed the negative impact of the evaluative gaze. In response, these women mitigated the negative impact of media as much as possible by avoiding media, critiquing media, and accessing and creating alternative forms of media. The current study found that Disengagement from Personal Relationships is one component of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Others’ External Gaze. Feminist writers and researchers have documented the consistent presence of pressures on women towards striving for thinness (Bartky, 1988; Bartky, 1990; Main & Kelly, 2005; Wolf, 1991). Indeed, most participants in the present investigation struggled with past or present experiences of parental judgment, restriction, and criticism of their physical activity, bodies, and weight. Some parents overtly criticized their daughters’ bodies; however, these women were able to limit the impact of negative comments by creating boundaries, voicing
236 their overt disagreement with body based expectations, and by taking distance away from disruptive family relationships. Such actions are similar to the proposition that it is essential to create boundaries in order to define one’s own sense of self (Pipher, 1994). The present study found that Personal Practices regarding body weight and size, and beauty practices, were components of the experience of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Other’s External Gaze. Carter’s (2011) study of women’s everyday body practices related to normative femininity found that women experienced their bodies in negative ways as something to be controlled. Carter did not find that participants consciously or deliberately resisted this control, although participants did experience an ongoing tension between care for their bodies and compliance with cultural dictates of feminine practices. The findings of the present study do not support Carter’s research, as the women in the present study did consciously resist cultural dictates and other’s efforts to control their bodies while simultaneously experiencing their bodies in positive ways. The differing results of this study compared to Carter’s research may be attributable to the specifically joyful embodied stance of participants in the current study and their purposeful resistance of appearance related pressures. Women learn expectations regarding feminine clothes, bodies, facial expressions, and behaviour—including cosmetics that assume the inadequacy of women’s appearance and require the routine alteration of women’s faces through the use of makeup (Bartky, 1988; Bordo, 1997). The concept that one might be able to choose what size and shape of body to have is considered by some to be a feature of consumer culture (Urla & Swedlund, 2000). Women in the present study were aware of these cultural prescriptions, however, they had the capacity to reject said prescriptions. It is interesting to note that feminist theorists have commented that a man may be celebrated for his style, wit, and intelligence, however, “no female can achieve the status of
237 romantic or sexual ideal without the appropriate body” (Bordo, 1988, p. 101), words that were closely mirrored by participants in the current study who rejected society’s gendered expectations. There is a tension between how we think larger women feel in their bodies and how they actually experience their bodies. While there is ample evidence that women of all sizes are dissatisfied with their body weight (Dolan & Gitzinger, 1994; McKinley, 2002; Rodin et. al, 1985; Thompson, 1994), fat women in particular have been silenced in their experiences, which are presumed by others to be pathological, with poor body image, increased depression, and sexual dysfunction (Murray, 2008; Sewel, 2008). However, there is a discrepancy between the cultural assumption that “fat women hate themselves” (Shields, 2002, p. 166), and the present research. Indeed, there are disagreements within the existing research literature, with considerable in-group differences among fat people with regards to body image (Schwartz & Brownell, 2004). A review of the research, which claims that being fat is often linked with poor body image, bases this conclusion primarily on research of fat dieters, rather than on fat nondieters or on body accepting fat people (Schwartz & Brownell, 2004). In contrast to research which found that fat people (primarily women) utilized strategies of withdrawal, invisibility, and disembodiment as responses to discrimination against their bodies (Owen, 2012), the women in the present study engaged with others and embraced themselves. This difference may be attributable to the overtly joyful and body accepting stance of the present research participants. With regards to previous research on fat women who embrace fat acceptance, “personal body ideals were more important in predicting body experience than body size per se” (McKinley, 2004, p. 218), with greater benefits for those who endorsed social change as well as personal acceptance (McKinley, 2004), as supported by the present study. Research on fat women who accessed the Internet to locate off-line sexual partners
238 demonstrated resilience significantly and positively related to survey respondents’ body image, self-esteem, and sexual quality of life (Sewel, 2008). The findings of the present study demonstrated ongoing tension within the literature, and indicated that fat women—and indeed women of all sizes—negotiated and rejected the expectation that their bodies would be a source of shame and unhappiness. The women in this study negotiated constraining expectations via their own personal bodily practices. Several women did at times comply with norms around beauty behaviours; however, these women were critical of those norms and attempted to engage with them subversively. Occasionally, the women struggled to hold on to their own sense of comfort with themselves while resisting the power of others’ judgmental external gaze. Ultimately, the external gaze was problematized by the women, and their rejection and dismissal of the gaze enabled them to refocus on their own beliefs and practices surrounding their bodies. These women’s bodily practices were centred on activities focused around their own experience, leading to joy. It is particularly important to note that women’s daily acts and personal practices had deep meaning for them, with regards to resistance to cultural dictates. Theorists have suggested that because bodies are a site of struggle, women must work to ensure daily practices are serving resistance rather than docility (Bordo, 1997). Bordo (1997) conceptualized liberation and pleasure as being accessible by rejecting proscribed routes and through refusing to buy into popular representations; such a refusal requires a concern for praxis within feminist politics. Others have emphasized the meaning of body practices as acts of resistance by describing women’s, capacity to discover the historical links between certain modes of selfunderstanding and modes of domination, and to resist the ways in which we have already been classified and identified by dominant discourses. This means discovering new ways of understanding ourselves and each other, refusing to accept the dominant cultures’ characterizations of our practices and desires, and redefining them from within resistant cultures. (Sawicki, 1988, p. 186)
239 Similarly, small acts of resistance are important in order to respond to everyday unfair treatment: “Individual biographies are situated within all domains of power and reflect their interconnections… the interpersonal domain functions through routinized, day-to-day practices… Such practices are systematic, recurrent, and so familiar that they often go unnoticed” (Hill Collins, 2000, p. 287). The results of the present study provided empirical support for Hill Collin’s (2000) and Sawicki’s (1988) theoretical propositions and generally demonstrated resistance. It may be beneficial for women to experience other cultures in the world in order to consider the pursuit of thinness from another perspective (Szekely, 1988), given that outer realities of women’s lives shape women’s inner experiences (Ali, 2006). The experiences of women in the current study demonstrated that those with cross-cultural experiences did have perspectives on body ideals that were enriched by their cross-cultural experiences. In the present study, women’s immigration experiences impacted them: “The social and interpersonal are construed as essential elements in psychological growth and development…. socially mediated identities that are fostered by numerous contextual influences” (Ali, 2006, p. 347). Others have suggested that diverse women must jointly struggle to root out internalized oppression in order to create social change (Lorde, 1990); this dynamic was created in the focus group, where participants commented on how diverse their backgrounds and perspectives were, yet they observed that they were connected by their desire to resist cultural dictates of appearance and to instead engage in embodied joy. The present study found that a Critical Political Consciousness was one component of Enacting Joy within the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Navigating the Imposition of Other’s External Gaze. Women particularly connected their engagement in joyful body activities to their politics, beliefs, and values regarding women’s feminine behaviour, bodies, dieting or
240 food preoccupation, and beauty. The women in the present study enacted a variety of different strategies of resistance to the external gaze, centred on their beliefs regarding their own independence, as well as engagement in reading, dialogues within groups, and political action. Through political activism, these women changed the way they lived in their bodies and mitigated the external gaze in order to engage in joyful body experiences. Their experience of joy was personal, but it was also a political issue and an expression of resistance against societal pressures to engage in weight reduction and body striving. In the present investigation, several participants identified the positive impact of exposure to feminist beliefs and values on their resistance to body expectations. Murnen and Smolak (2009) conducted a meta-analysis that examined whether feminist women were protected from body image problems. They found that there was a significant positive association between feminist identity and positive body attitudes, which they attributed to the protective effect of a heightened ability to critique cultural pressures related to thinness. However, Liimakka (2011) found that cognitive strategies of resistance among women’s studies students left the emotional elements of body dissatisfaction intact, and suggested that future research explore agency within the body, with a focus on corporeal agency (or body-based, embodied agency), as well as the importance of interdependency with others. The present study addresses corporeal agency by focusing on embodied experiences, and, indeed, body dissatisfaction was not intact for participants in the present study; participants rejected body dissatisfaction and embraced their bodies. The particular finding that participants resisted appearance norms is in line with feminist theory on this issue, which proposes that external pressure keeps women powerless and focused on unrealistic body-based goals, wasting energy on striving to reduce their body size and critiquing other women instead of uniting with other women against oppressive social forces
241 (Bartky, 1988; Bartky, 1990; Main & Kelly, 2005; Wolf, 1991). Resistance is theorized as essential, peer driven, and utilizing strategies to support women in recognizing the ways in which women’s bodies are classified by problematic dominant discourses. These societal pressures must be rejected in order for women to focus on their own understanding of themselves and others from within a different context of resistant cultures (Sawicki, 1988; Wolf, 1991). With regards to joy impacting social activism, the findings of the present study, whereby communities of resistance and joy are a component of a critical political consciousness, are also reflective of Shepard’s (2005) research. Shepard studied joy as a vital element and a tool to organize global peace and economic justice. A sense of joy ran through the activists’ approaches within Shepard’s study, as well as revitalizing the activists: “If alienation, social isolation, and a turn away from public life are what ail contemporary civil culture… a sense of equality and justice is necessary to create conditions for joy to thrive” (p. 436). Shepard noted the inclusion of righteous anger as well as community connection in the joyful experience, which was focused on opposition to oppression and support for liberation. Ultimately, this playfulness and joy was theorized as being in the service of undermining power, as well as opening up space for those resisting, in order to relate non-oppressively to themselves and others (Bell, 1993). Similarly, in a study of 25 oral histories of activists who organized around intersectional oppressions related to race, class, gender, sexuality, disability, and nation, Doetsch-Kidder (2012) found that activists’ work brought them joy. Doetsch-Kidder also found that bringing love, hope, and joy to activist work promoted positive social change. The author further described that participants experienced joy in helping others through small acts of activism and living in communities of resistance. Joy shared with others has the capacity to build bridges and be the foundation of alliance and solidarity (Kast, 1991). Participants in the present investigation similarly noted the importance of Communities of Resistance and Joy, as a sub-theme within Critical Political
242 Consciousness, in supporting women’s experiences of embodied joy and resistance to the dominant culture. The current study’s findings regarding particular narratives and strategies of resistance are an important contribution to the research literature. The findings demonstrate forms of action that women have taken and how “stories of resistance shape the women who hear them and it treats resistance as an essential element in a process that gives rise to resilience and empowerment” (Warner, Baro, & Eigenberg, 2004, p. 22). Ultimately, women’s engagement in joyful body activities may at times themselves be considered to be acts of resistance. For example, Ophelia’s bicycling activity: as a self-described fat woman in society, it is an act of resistance to regularly be engaged in a highly visible and highly physical outdoor activity. Given the stigma and discrimination directed towards fat women, it is “surprising that some fat people are indeed able to come to an acceptance of—indeed pleasure in—their own bodies” (Farrell, 2011, p. 163). Participants’ capacity to engage in resistance reflects the possibilities of marginality as a site of power, creativity, and resistance, with the possibility of radical perspectives enabling women to imagine an alternative; I write these words to bear witness to the primacy of struggle in any situation of domination (even within family life), to the strength and power that emerges from sustained resistance, and the profound conviction that these forces can be healing, can protect us from dehumanization and despair. (hooks, 1991, p. 339) 7.1.4. Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy. Study participants experienced an ongoing process in their journey to joy. The decision to be joyful often required a substantial amount of effort in order to overcome disruptions and reconnect with the self. These women’s journeys reflected that joyful body experiences were not simply provided to them, but involved ongoing attunement to needs and desires, agency in creating spaces of joy, and resistance to oppressive conceptualizations of women’s bodies. Women experienced both disruption and reconnection to experiences of joy throughout their life.
243 For example, while appearance focused phases did occur in several participants’ lives, they did not become a core aspect of these women’s identities. Finally, the findings of this study indicated that within this core dimension, and within the context of resistance and struggle, women enacted a journey to joy. As components of this journey, they reclaimed their childhood experiences, experienced times of disruption and reconnection, and outlined their ideas on guiding other girls and women in the journey to experiencing joyful embodiment that is not contingent on meeting societal expectations of femininity. The present study found that Reclaimed Childhood Experiences were a component of enacting joy in the context of resistance and struggle, and journeying to joy. The findings of the present investigation regarding journeys of disruption and reconnection to joy are in accordance with suggestions that childhood protective factors play a role in adults’ capacity to engage in joyful embodied experiences, including the benefits of ties with both family members and other role models in the community (Piran & Teall, 2012). In research on flourishing, Ryff and Singer (2003) noted that with regards to resilience in the face of challenge, childhood protective factors included: temperament, intelligence, self-esteem, nurturing ties with family members, and connections with others in the community. Childhood risk factors included poverty, parental psychopathology, parental divorce, and care giving deficits. Results of the present study suggest that childhood self-esteem, nurturing ties, and connections with others contribute to women reclaiming their childhood experiences of joyful body activities. With regards to the theme of Disruption and Reconnection as an element of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy, feminist theorists have noted a false reality embedded in the culture that implies that changing my body equals changing my life. Feminist theorists propose a shift from pleasing others with appearance to pleasing the self
244 through one’s core being (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995; Main & Kelly, 2005; Szekely, 1998). Notably, focus group participants engaged in a detailed conversation regarding their understandings and experiences of these issues and reported that they are supported in resisting body striving and appearance pressure, and resolving disruptions, through their reliance on joyful body activities. Theorists have proposed that exercising for pleasure, strength, and endurance, not weight loss, might have a role in the process of women reclaiming themselves (Hirschmann & Munter, 1995); this was the case for some of the women in this study who experienced disruption and reconnection. The results of this study demonstrate that women displayed a remarkable capacity for resilience whereby they faced adversity and developed adaptive strategies in order to respond and move forward through disruption to reconnection (Warner et al., 2004). The present study found that Guiding Other Girls and Women was a component of Enacting Joy in the Context of Resistance and Struggle: Journey to Joy. Findings from the present study were supported by Ross et al.’s (2003) research—a participatory study utilizing focus groups with 48 girls, which found that participants saw the media as being responsible for better depicting a diversity of representations. In the present study, participants agreed that more accurate media representation would benefit girls. The women in this study reflected upon their own beliefs regarding what might support girls and women, and came to similar conclusions that for girls to grow into healthy adults, they must engage in activities with a focus on body feelings, body acceptance, and their own values, rather than defining self by appearance (Pipher, 1994). 7.2. Strengths and Limitations 7.2.1. Strengths of the Present Study. A particular strength of the present study is its contribution in bridging the theoryresearch gap in the literature addressing women’s experience of embodied joy. Women’s actual
245 lived experiences were studied, and the findings of the current study reflect an understanding as to what those experiences meant to the women themselves. The emphasis on positive experiences, on women’s agency, and on processes of resistance are responsive to criticisms of psychological research that has tended to examine women’s negative experiences and adversity in collusion with oppressive structures (Prilleltensky & Nelson, 2002; Szekely, 1988; Young, 2005). The present study utilized feminist research principles of power sharing through ensuring space was provided for participants to discuss their experiences, verifying that these experiences were understood, and enabling participants to alter their words. The study also used a mixed method approach, utilizing both individual interviews and a focus group (Giddings, 2006; Gilbert, 2006). Another strength of this study is the diversity of participants in terms of ethnocultural heritage, religious affiliation, levels of ability/disability, sexual orientation, and body types. The diversity of participants responds to calls for additional research on how diverse women think about their bodies (McKinley, 2002). The present study explores an emergent research area by bridging the theory regarding women’s resistance to body dissatisfaction, with the theory and research on joyful experiences. It is the first study of its kind to address the relationship between these issues. According to Ali (2006), psychological research has the potential to contribute to activism by sharing information and material learned from oppressed groups, and may also “serve an emancipatory function for research participants” (p. 31). Strengths of the present research are its responsiveness to the call for feminist research to be emancipatory, and its engagement with research participants in creating socially responsive research that has the potential to serve women’s emancipation.
246 7.2.2. Limitations of the Present Study. Though the group of participants was diverse in terms of ethnocultural heritage, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, ability/disability, and body type, participants in the present study primarily included women who were highly educated and women who were childless, with few exceptions. Though the researcher made attempts to recruit women from lower income ranges and women who had not attended institutions of higher education, the researcher’s lack of financial resources and resulting inability to provide financial compensation for participation in the study was a barrier to these groups’ participation. It is understandable that women of lower socioeconomic status may have less access to transit and a reduced capacity to take the necessary time away from paid work or childcare responsibilities in order to participate in a study with no financial compensation. Similarly, women with children may have had limitations in accessing child care for the purpose of a study with no financial incentive to offset such a cost. The study could have further clarified several responses on the demographic questionnaire. For example, more specific queries regarding White participants’ ethnocultural heritage would have been appropriate, as several participants identified themselves simply as “White” or “Canadian” with no further details. White people may neglect to note their race because they are in “the default category, the unmarked dominant status in North America, and often invisible as such” (Aulette, Wittner, & Blakely, 2009, p. 4). The size of the group of participants was an additional limitation. Though Seidman’s (1991) criterion of saturation was reached, a greater number of participants may have further enriched the findings derived from the study. A larger number of participants would also have allowed for the enhancement of the diversity of the group, in terms of ethnocultural heritage, financial status, ability/disability, sexual orientation, parenting status, educational attainment, and other social factors.
247 The number of interviews may be considered another limitation. The study involved only single interviews. The intention behind limiting the number of interviews was to enable participants to take part in the study with the least time commitment possible, which, the researcher felt, was necessary given the lack of financial remuneration for participation. All participants were offered the option of engaging in second interviews, which may have further clarified their experiences; however, the researcher requested no second interviews, nor were second interviews requested by any of the participants. All 13 participants provided written feedback and approval regarding the researcher’s understanding of their experiences. Additionally, only one focus group was conducted. Further focus groups would have provided additional research space for participants to engage in positive body talk, and different groups may have raised a broader variety of topics for discussion, with more varying perspectives. Another potential limitation of the present study involved a basic assumption of the study, based in the wealth of theoretical literature, that identified that women who were actively body striving in order to reduce their size or change the shape of their bodies were not experiencing their bodies in positive and joyful ways (Bartky, 1988; Bartky, 1990; Bordo, 1997; Main & Kelly, 2005; Reilly, 1999; Szekely, 1988; Wolf, 1991; Young, 2005). Thus women who did not meet the research criteria of resisting negative body talk, and who experienced a reasonably high degree of bodily satisfaction, were excluded from the study. While this is a premise within the feminist theoretical literature on embodiment, there is a lack of research material that directly addresses this assumption. However, the research on internalized selfobjectification does support this premise; research by Quinn et al. (2006) found that selfobjectification has disruptive impacts on performance due to attention being split between the task at hand and the monitoring of participants’ appearances. Therefore this assumption may be justified as self-objectification; it may also have implications for women in their daily lives.
248 When in performance situations, such as taking exams, presenting projects, interviewing for jobs, or competing in athletic events, small decreases in performance can impact outcome and reduce joy in everyday activities (Quinn et al., 2006). Additionally, women who have recovered from bulimia could be a source of information on recovery (Peters & Fallon, 1994). While recognizing that women with eating disorders may not be radically different from those with common female experiences of body dissatisfaction— given that eating disorders are not necessarily individual problems but demonstrate contradictions in practices—the present study did not access that possibility (Bordo, 1988; Szekely, 1988). While some of these decisions regarding recruitment and eligibility restrictions may have been potential constraints, they were employed in an attempt to focus on participants with more similar experiences, in order to more deeply explore women’s embodied experiences of joy. Finally, arguably inherent in qualitative inquiry is an explicit recognition of the researcher’s subjectivity. In the current analysis, attempts were made to stay grounded in the data during the data analysis process through checking with participants to ensure the researcher’s understanding of their experiences. However, as noted in the Methodology chapter, the researcher’s understandings of embodied joyful experiences sensitized her to the exploration of various aspects of participants’ lived experiences. 7.3. Suggestions for Future Research There are a wide variety of options for future research in this area, given the dearth of research on joyful embodiment, joyful experiences, and joy as a form of resistance. Future research might examine more specifically any of the findings of this study, within various diverse groups, including studies with girls throughout various developmental phases. In particular, a longitudinal examination of the process of disruption and reconnection with the
249 experience of joy could be conducted. A comparison of women who experience embodied joy as a form of resistance to the dominant cultural expectations compared with women who identify experiencing embodied joy while still engaging in cultural expectations could be completed. Additionally, although body expectations apply to women of all sizes, a comparative study of fat women and thin women’s body experience may provide information regarding the impact of the stigmatization of fat, with increased understandings of both similarities and differences between these groups. The findings of the current study problematize the use of body image as a central construct to describe women’s embodied lives. Additionally, the role of emotion in the experience of embodiment is an area that may be addressed. A study of older women’s joyful embodiment could also help provide increased understanding of women’s life-long relationship to joy. During early adolescence, girls “crash and burn” (Pipher, 1994, p. 19), by losing resiliency and optimism; they become less curious, less assertive, less inclined to take risks, and less energetic (Pipher, 1994). It would be worthwhile to research the process whereby this shift occurs. A particular assessment of joyful embodiment within diverse communities based on ethnocultural identification, religious group, sexuality, disability, or body size could be conducted. Additionally, studying transgendered individuals’ experiences of embodied joy, and more broadly of embodiment, may enhance the understanding of the internalization of, and resistance to, social norms regarding femininity and the body. Larger scale qualitative studies may be completed, as may quantitative studies. A joyful embodiment scale could be created for use with survey research, based on qualitative inquiries. Additionally, the current study addressed only the experiences of women with regards to joyful body experiences; this was by design, given the described differing experiences of men
250 compared to women in regards to body experiences, objectification, and gendered expectations. However, an investigation of the impact of dictates of masculinity on males’ body experience may further inform not only the experiences of men, but also more broadly, the relationship between cultural dictates and experiences of joy. The present study did not address mental health difficulties in depth with participants. This is a relevant direction for future research, as feminist theorists have conceptualized body dissatisfaction as a social justice issue that accounts for numerous mental health struggles for women, including depression, sexual dysfunction, and eating disorders (Harrison & Fredrickson, 2003; Reilly, 1999). Additionally, several participants in the present study identified having experienced a past history of interpersonal trauma. The connection between trauma and joy may be an area of further exploration, whereby currently the potential exists that people may have the capacity to “intentionally increase their positivity ratios by learning to widen the attentional lens to encompass more of the pleasurable, interesting, and meaningful experiences in life, making the painful and dissatisfying ones smaller by comparison” (Garland, et al., 2010, p. 860). Thus the potential for joy to be employed in order to promote post-traumatic growth, and the impact of trauma on joyful embodiment, might be investigated. 7.4. Clinical and Health Promotion Implications The current study has both clinical and health promotion implications. The results suggest that joyful embodiment experiences are complex experiences that continually develop over the course of women’s lives; this provides hope that patterns of disruption, or of disruption and reconnection to joyful body experiences, may be changed or facilitated through different interventions. In particular, the study suggests that girls and women could benefit from support in creating safe spaces, engagement in diverse activities, deconstructing media, disengaging from problematic relationships, and embracing communities of resistance and joy. Thus, the results of
251 this study may guide practitioners in assisting clients to create environments that nurture joy, as well as the specific practices that may assist in resistance—particularly with regards to each of the preceding elements. Predominantly for practitioners who identify as feminist and are willing to address the impact of the broader cultural lens, this study provides potential areas for clients to work on that include both individual resistance and the benefits of broader cultural resistance in creating communities of resistance and embracing a critical political consciousness. The Health at Every Size (HAES) perspective reflects a clinical model that is line with the findings of the study. The model emphasizes weight-neutral health outcomes, with a focus on body acceptance, eating behaviour, nutrition, activity, and social support. These elements emerged in the study as being important to joyful body experiences. Burgard (2010) is a therapist who advocates for weight neutrality in clinical practice and emphasizes the importance of practitioners’ awareness that weight-based discrimination is as common as age- and race-based discrimination. Burgard noted that oppressed groups improve their mental and physical health by rejecting negative and stigmatizing messages, while at the same time connecting with other members of the stigmatized group, paying attention to the validity of their own experiences, and identifying the stereotypes, stigma, and discrimination they face. Historically, when oppressed groups reject their stigmatized status, these groups are able to transform shame into pride, and society changes from devaluing the stigmatized group to seeing the value of human diversity (Burgard, 2010). Burgard suggests that this will also be the case with body size. The present study provides further support regarding the benefits of encouraging a critical political consciousness regarding issues of oppression, particularly oppression related to weight, size, and expectations regarding expected feminine bodily appearance and behaviour. The present study has further discerned the relevance and importance of joy in women’s lives, and the potential benefits of utilizing joy in a clinical setting—particularly the benefits of
252 focusing on expanding women’s repertoire of embodied experiences of joy. The current study supports theoretical work, whereby joy has been posited as a source of curative processes applicable in psychotherapy, with joy as “a core indicator of therapeutic change leading to an increase in intrapsychic resources and life satisfaction” (Dick-Niederhauser, 2009, p. 187), indicating a process of self-transformation. Joy has been posited as an emotional correlate of healing; joy is described as the affective-experiential component of happiness, and as an intense and generally brief feeling of bliss (Dick-Niederhauser, 2009). Clinicians have recommended studying experiences that trigger joy, with potential links to therapeutic interventions and conditions, given that joy shifted clients’ perspectives (Dick-Niederhauser, 2009; Kast, 1991). In particular, it has been suggested that therapeutic work should begin with an emphasis on joy, vitality, and freedom, with the therapeutic goals of reconstructing each individual client’s own biography regarding the nature and function of joy in their lives, in order to increase their feelings of joy and wholeness (Kast, 1991). Additionally, this study normalizes women’s experiences, the experience of disruption and reconnection, and both joy and resistance as adaptive and ongoing processes. With regards to both clinical and health promotion implications, the finding that a core element of women’s journey to joy is their reclaiming of childhood experiences indicates that, clinically, women who are seeking to engage in joyful embodiment may be encouraged to reflect upon their childhood experiences and seek joyful activities with which to reconnect. The health promotion implications of the current study reflect the assertion that advances in prevention result from a focus on competency building (Seligman, 2003). There is a widespread belief that prevention is the best solution to the problem of negative body image (Levine & Smolak, 2002; Pipher, 1994). However, prevention programs tend to focus on the individual to the exclusion of changes to the social environment (Levine & Smolak, 2002). The
253 findings delineated in the present study indicate that interventions may occur at a variety of points, not simply prior to women’s development of body dissatisfaction, but also once disruption has occurred. Additionally, the present study may provide guides regarding educational tools that may support prevention programs encouraging women to claim their power for themselves in order to create change in their own body experiences as well as changes in their social environments—from a multidimensional perspective that focuses on the experience of joy, creating environments that nurture joy, engaging with joy within the context of resistance and struggle, and recognizing the journey to joy. With regards to health promotion, the results of the present investigation indicate that it is important for women to be able to access some touchstone or memory of joyful body experiences from their childhood in order to connect, or re-connect, with their own joyful body experiences. The results of the present research imply that young girls should be encouraged in their joyful activities. Girls need to focus on elements that are not related to appearance when choosing from a range of activities. The study also demonstrates the importance of education regarding media deconstruction, supporting girls’ and women’s capacity to resist media messages—which has implications for health promotion. Also, with regards to health promotion, the findings from this study indicate that access to safe space, and space in the natural world, are essential for both girls and women; this need for space may have policy implications, for example, with regards to funding programs such a camps and community centres. Additionally, financial support that enables them to engage in those activities would create accessible activity options for girls. Further, participants’ narratives suggest that there are several elements associated with childhood and adolescent parenting behaviour, which could be relevant to the development of, and capacity to re-engage with, joyful body experiences. Participants noted the importance of supportive relationships, positive role-models, safe spaces, and access to engagement in joyful
254 body activities, as well as access to critical political consciousness. These results suggest that supporting girls and women to engage in joyful body experiences, rather than engaging in activities as a form of punitive body striving, may be enacted through programs that focus on supporting parents and providing access to beneficial, joyful body activities for their children. Ultimately, the goal of prevention and health promotion is for women to maintain their joyful embodied stance, and for those who have become disconnected, “not to transcend this body, but to reclaim it” (Rich, 1986, p. 213). 7.5. Concluding Questions The present research is emergent and raises a number of questions and possibilities regarding conceptualizations of embodied joy, questions that go beyond the current discussion which considered women’s experiences and the body while challenging gender expectations and social location. Given that joy as a construction has been structured by the male lens, as has the language of joy, do we need to problematize the language? Though women’s perspectives and self-definitions mediate the language of joy, the women themselves exist as part of a patriarchy in which language shapes our experience and responses to internalized oppression (Du Bois, 1983). Additionally, does the present research construct joy for women in particular; given that our experiences are gendered, do men experience joy differently, or is it beyond gender? A deeper understanding of the ways in which women’s ethnocultural marking contributes to the journey to joy is also necessary. Are there different representations of joy culturally, given that the body is seen and read differently in different cultures? It is possible that the journey to joy as conceptualized in the current study implies a new conceptualization or definition of joy. However, this area of study requires ongoing investigation in order to deepen our understanding of embodied joy as a form of resistance for diverse women.
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Appendix A Individual Interview Protocol Interview Guidelines: The interview will begin by asking the participant to describe their feelings about their bodies and how these feelings have impacted their lives (questions 1 and 2 below). The interviewer will use the following questions and prompts to facilitate this discussion. These questions will only be addressed after discussing all topics that were spontaneously raised by the participant. Introduction to the Interview: Thank you for agreeing to this interview. I am interested in a focus on feeling good in your body, not your body as you see it, but as you feel it, experience it, accept and enjoy and celebrate it. I have some questions that I will be asking you, but it is up to you what you choose to talk about; please feel free to decline to answer any questions for any reason. As well, after I have transcribed this interview, you will have an opportunity to change or remove any element of it. All identifying information will be removed from the transcript. Please feel free to add anything you like at any point. Do you have any questions about the interview or the research process? Interview Questions: 1. What has made you interested in being involved in this study and participating in this interview? 2. This study looks at women’s experiences of being in their bodies, and your experiences of having joyful experiences in the body. How would you describe joyful experiences in your body? 3. When you reflect on your life, what has enabled you to have these experiences? What do you think generally supports women in experiencing joy in their bodies? Potential Probes: Have you always felt this way about your body? ⋅ What is your earliest positive memory of your body? Have your feelings about your body impacted your relationships? - friends - family members - romantic relationships Why do you think so many women feel negatively about their bodies? - Where do women learn to feel badly about their bodies? What keeps women feeling badly about their bodies? - Who benefits from women feeling negatively about their bodies? 270
271 - What might be different about our society if women felt good about their bodies, regardless of what they look like? What do you think would help other women to have positive body feelings and experiences? Can you think of times when you’ve felt really good in your body? I’m wondering about the intersections of activities and your feelings – what physical activities do you find most pleasurable? -outdoors? -being physically active? -on your own? - with other people? When it comes to practices around your body, do you do anything different from what you believe women are expected to do? Do you connect with other women around issues of feeling positive in your body? What about connecting with other women around issues of feeling bad about your body? How do you deal with media messages on appropriate body types? What do you think of the thin ideal? How do you think you’ve developed a sense of joy in your body? How do you feel about what you see when you look at your body? How do you feel about who you are? How do you feel during the times that you feel great in your body? How do you think you’ve been able to accept your body as it is, as you are? Do you feel that you’ve over come the broader society’s focus on thinness or that you never had it? Are there times when you have a sense of freedom in your body? Could you share an activity that you’re involved in, or a memory of activities that gives you a sense of pleasure, joy, or well being in your body? Probes on hobbies, moving through community
Appendix B Demographic Questionnaire Please note, answering these questions is optional
1. How old are you? __________ 2. Where were you born? Country of birth ________________ Rural / Urban _________________ 3. How do you identify your ethnocultural heritage? ______________________ 4. Do you have any children? No Ο
Yes Ο If yes how many? ____________
5. Sexual orientation: __________________ 6. Have you been or are you currently involved in a partnering relationship?: _____ 7. What is your highest level of education? _________________________________ 8. What is your present occupation? ______________________________________ 9. What are your parents’ highest levels of education? Mother ________________
Father _____________________
10. What are your parents’ occupations? Mother ________________
Father ______________________
11. What is your current household income? Under $20,000 per year ________________ $20,000 to $40,000 per year ____________ $40,000 to $60,000 per year ____________ Above $60,000 per year ___________
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Appendix C Information and Recruitment Letter
Do you experience a sense of joy, pleasure and well-being in your body, no matter how you look? Do you resist the expectation that women constantly be “working on” or “improving” their bodies, and instead focus on your positive, joyful body experiences? What is the aim of the study? We are looking for research participants who identify a focus on feeling good in your body, not as others may see and assess it, but as you feel in your body, experience it, see, accept, enjoy and celebrate it. Who is eligible to participate? We are looking for women of diverse backgrounds, between the ages of 20 to 39. We are looking for women who are generally satisfied with their appearance, regardless of whether they fit the cultural ideal. Participants should be able to easily identify times of feeling joy, pleasure and well-being in their body. We are not looking for women who find it hard to connect with positive body experiences, or only connect with them when they lose weight or come close to meeting an ideal. The study does not include women who are in treatment for eating related problems. What does the research involve? The research involves participating in 1 interview, which will be a conversation about positive, joyful body experiences. This interview will take place at The University of Toronto. There is an optional second interview which may occur, if needed, approximately 1 to 2 months after the first interview. Several weeks following the interviews, participants will be offered the option of participating in a focussed group discussion with other women who enjoy positive body experiences. Who are we? My name is Elyse Peasley, and I am a doctoral student in Counselling Psychology at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. If you are interested in participating in this research, or for more information about this study, please contact Elyse Peasley at
[email protected] to arrange a phone call to discuss participation in this research.
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Appendix D Interview Consent Letter
Women’s experiences of Embodied Joy: Resisting the cultural dictate of bodily dissatisfaction Dear Participant, My name is Elyse Peasley; I am a doctoral student working with Dr. Niva Piran in the Department of Adult Education and Counselling Psychology at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto (OISE/UT). I am asking for your consent/permission to participate in the research project that I am working on, on the topic of women’s experiences of joy in their bodies. Purpose of the Research This research study is being undertaken with the goal of exploring issues around women’s positive body experiences. Women in Western society are expected to experience body dissatisfaction, and constantly be working to make their bodies fit an unrealistic ideal. I’m interested in the ways that women are able to resist this expectation, and, regardless of how their body appears, instead experience their bodies in positive, pleasurable and joyful ways. Rather then negative body talk and experiences, this research is exploring positive and joyful experiences as a way of combating the expectation of dissatisfaction. Description of the Research If you agree to participate, I will interview you 1-2 times, in an interview that will last about 1½ –2 hours or so, depending on how much time you need. Somewhere between 8-16 women will be participating in individual interviews. The interview will be scheduled at a time and in a place that is convenient for you, likely a private room at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto, at your home, or at another place of your choosing. During the interview, you will be asked to answer questions and discuss issues that relate to positive body experiences and times you’ve felt joyful in your body. After the first interview, I will contact you if a second interview is needed for clarification. There will be no compensation for participation in this research. In addition to a thesis, this research may result in publications or public presentations. Confidentiality Confidentiality will be respected and your identity will be protected unless required by law. The interview will be audiotaped; the tapes will be transcribed. The tapes will be kept in a locked file cabinet until the completion of the study, and will then be destroyed. The interview transcripts will be coded using a research code name only and will not contain your name or other identifying information, nor will any written reports, publications or presentations. All interviews and data files will be kept in locked filing cabinets and will be accessible only to the investigator, 274
275 the research supervisor, and a transcriptionist. However, there are some exceptions to the confidentiality of the information shared during the interview; these situations are unlikely to occur. Confidentiality will not be protected if you report intending to harm yourself or another person, if you report that a child is being harmed or in danger or being harmed by the participant or by another adult, or if you report sexual abuse by a regulated health care professional. Potential Benefits to Participating The possible benefits to participating in this research include an opportunity for increased reflection on issues relevant to your experiences in the body, and an opportunity to learn about the research results across participants. Women rarely have the opportunity to talk about pleasant aspects of their body experience; this research is intended to give you space to talk about that. Potential Harms, Discomforts or Inconveniences It is likely that there will be no risks to you as a result of participating in this research. However, you may feel some discomfort when discussing your experiences. If that is the case, you are welcome to decline to participate, and if you decide to participate, you are free to skip any questions, request a break, or withdraw from the study at any point, with no negative consequences. I will check in about how you are feeling throughout the interview process. After the interview, you will be provided with a list of appropriate counselling referrals. You are invited to contact them if you find yourself feeling distressed about any part of the process. Participation Participation in this study is voluntary, and you may decline to answer any question, withdraw from the study at any time, or withdraw your data at any time prior to the submission of the research as a completed PhD dissertation, without negative consequences. I will give you a copy of this consent form for your records. Information regarding the results of this study may be obtained, if desired, by filling out the attached form. If you have any questions about your rights as a participant in research, you may contact the University of Toronto Ethics Review Office at 416-946-3273. If you have any questions about this particular study, please contact Elyse Peasley at
[email protected] or Dr. Niva Piran at
[email protected] or 416-978-0712.
“The research procedures described above have been explained to me, and any questions that I have asked have been answered to my satisfaction. I have been informed of my right not to participate in this study, or to withdraw at any time. As well, potential harms have been explained to me. I know that I may ask any questions I have about the study or research procedures; I may ask these questions now or at a future time. I have been assured that research records relating to my participation with be kept confidential and that no information will be released that would disclose my personal identity without my permission, unless required by law. I hereby consent to participate in this study”.
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______________________ Name of Participant _______________________ Signature _____________________________ Date
Do you consent to this interview being audiotaped? Yes: ______ No:______ ______________________ Name of Participant _______________________ Signature _____________________________ Date
Appendix E Focus Group Consent Letter
Women’s experiences of Embodied Joy: Resisting the cultural dictate of bodily dissatisfaction Dear Participant, My name is Elyse Peasley; I am a doctoral student working with Dr. Niva Piran in the Department of Adult Education and Counselling Psychology at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto (OISE/UT). I am asking for your consent/permission to participate in the research project that I am working on, on the topic of women’s experiences of joy in their bodies. Purpose of the Research This research study is being undertaken with the goal of exploring issues around women’s positive body experiences. Women in Western society are expected to experience body dissatisfaction, and constantly be working to make their bodies fit an unrealistic ideal. I’m interested in the ways that women are able to resist this expectation, and, regardless of how their body appears, instead experience their bodies in positive, pleasurable and joyful ways. Rather then negative body talk and experiences, this research is exploring positive and joyful experiences as a way of combating the expectation of dissatisfaction. Description of the Research If you agree to participate, the focus group will include other women who have participated in an individual interview. The group will last for about 2 hours, and we will meet in a private room at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. There will be a total of 4-8 participants in this focus group. During the focus group, you will be asked to answer questions and discuss issues that relate to positive body experiences and times you’ve felt joyful in your body. There will be no compensation for participation in this research. In addition to a thesis, this research may result in publications or public presentations. Confidentiality Other participants will be discussing the issues in this focus group; it is your choice what information you decide to share in this context. Confidentiality will be respected by the researcher and your identity will be protected unless required by law. However, you will be participating in a group forum and other participants are not obligated to maintain your confidentiality; there is an expectation that all information shared will be kept private by other group members, however, we cannot guarantee this. Please keep this in mind when deciding what to share with the group. The focus group will be audiotaped; the tapes will be transcribed. The tapes will be kept in a locked file cabinet until the completion of the study, and will then be destroyed. The transcripts will be coded using research code names only and will not contain 277
278 your name or other identifying information, nor will any written reports, publications or presentations. All tapes and data files will be kept in locked filing cabinets and will be accessible only to the investigator, the research supervisor, and a transcriptionist. There are some exceptions to the confidentiality of the information shared during the focus group; these situations are unlikely to occur. Confidentiality will not be protected by the researcher if you report intending to harm yourself or another person, if you report that a child is being harmed or in danger or being harmed by the participant or by another adult, or if you report sexual abuse by a regulated health care professional. Potential Benefits to Participating The possible benefits to participating in this research include an opportunity for increased reflection on issues relevant to your experiences in the body. Women rarely have the opportunity to talk about pleasant aspects of their body experience with other women who also have positive body experiences; this research is intended to give you space to talk about these experiences. Potential Harms, Discomforts or Inconveniences It is likely that there will be no risks to you as a result of participating in this research. However, you will be participating in a group forum and other participants are not obligated to maintain your confidentiality; there is an expectation that all information shared will be kept private by other group members, however, we cannot guarantee this. Please keep this in mind when deciding what to share with the group. As well, you may feel some discomfort when discussing your experiences with other women. If that is the case, you are welcome to decline to participate, and if you decide to participate, you are free to skip any questions, request a break, or withdraw from the study at any point. I will check in about how you are feeling throughout the focus group process. After the interview, you will be provided with a list of appropriate counselling referrals. You are invited to contact them if you find yourself feeling distressed about any part of the process. Participation Participation in this study is voluntary, and you may decline to answer any question, withdraw from the study at any time, or withdraw their data at any time prior to the submission of the research as a completed PhD dissertation, without negative consequences. I will give you a copy of this consent form for your records. Information regarding the results of this study may be obtained, if desired, by filling out the attached form. If you have any questions about your rights as a participant in research, you may contact the University of Toronto Ethics Review Office at 416-946-3273. If you have any questions about this study, please contact Elyse Peasley at
[email protected] or Dr. Niva Piran at
[email protected] or 416-978-0712.
“The research procedures described above have been explained to me, and any questions that I have asked have been answered to my satisfaction. I have been informed of my right not to participate in this study, or to withdraw at any time. As well, potential harms have been explained to me. I know that I may ask any questions I have about the study or research procedures; I may ask these questions now or at a future time. I have been
279 assured that research records relating to my participation with be kept confidential and that no information will be released that would disclose personal identity without my permission, unless required by law. I understand that other focus groups participants are not required to maintain confidentiality. I hereby consent to participate in this study”.
______________________ Name of Participant _______________________ Signature _____________________________ Date
Do you consent to this interview being audiotaped? Yes: ______ No:______ ______________________ Name of Participant _______________________ Signature _____________________________ Date
Appendix F Request for Information Form
If you are interested in receiving a transcript and summary of the results of this study, please indicate below and return this form to the principal investigator. A copy of the results will be sent to you by mail.
Name:_____________________________________ Would you like to receive a summary of this study’s findings? Yes_____
No ______
How would you prefer to receive this information? Mail, email or other ____________
Please provide the information necessary for the material to be sent to you. Mailing Address:_____________________________________________
City:________________________
Province:_____
OR Email: _______________________ OR Other: ________________________
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Postal Code:_____________
Appendix G Focus Group Protocol Focus group guidelines: The focus group is designed to have participants talk about similar experiences as they do in the individual interviews, but with an emphasis on discovering commonalities between their stories and linking their stories to the larger social context. Focus group questions: 1) What prompted you to want to come to the group today? 2) Let’s talk about positive body experiences. Could you share an activity that you’re involved in, or a memory of activities that gives you a sense of pleasure, joy, or well being in your body? 3) Through taking part in the interviews and taking part in this discussion today, what have you become aware of that you might not have given much thought to before? What is it like to think about these things? 4) What sorts of examples and messages about bodies do you encounter in your daily life? How do they make you feel? What do you do in response to these messages and examples? 5) If 8 (or 6 or 10) other women were sitting here today, do you think that they would be saying the same sorts of things or different things? 6) Who benefits from women feeling badly about their bodies? Who benefits from women feeling good about their bodies? What would happen if women started feeling good about their bodies? What would be different in women’s lives if they felt better about their body? 7) How can we help women to feel better about their bodies? 8) How does it feel to have this conversation with other women? How does it feel to hear other women talking positively about their bodily experiences? Does this contrast with other experiences you have had talking about your body with other women.
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Appendix H Specific activities that women experienced as joyful
1. Physical Physical activity or motion: Swimming, biking, rowing, soccer, badminton, snowshoeing, running, kayaking, climbing trees, hula hooping, slacklining, walking, gardening, belly dancing, martial arts, dancing, kickboxing Food creation and consumption Play: Dancing in underwear, snowball fights, tickling Pleasure / sensual: Touching self, smoothness, buoyancy, clothes / fabric, no clothes, sex, orgasm Relaxation: Self-care - washing hair, showering Sleep - rest, naps, being at home Massage, relaxation yoga, spa water treatments
2. Expressive Artistic /creative: Drawing, painting, knitting, embroidery, sewing Emotional expression: Journalling Music: Singing, dancing, drums Performative: Theatre Writing: Blogging, fatzine, journal, stories
3. Pragmatic Paid Work 282
283 Productive and practical: Providing own transportation, making own clothes Learning/teaching: Academics / school Reading Skill building: Toastmasters Science: Working with insects, aviation / technology, photography
4. Social/political/spiritual Political action Cultural events: Connection to home country, wedding Spiritual / Holistic practice: Meditation, yoga, silence, breathing, Buddhist retreat, Reiki, Shiatsuu Travel