A mediated me: an autoethnographic study of self, body and media
Date
2002
Authors
Dellebuur, Kristyll Jo-Ann
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Abstract
In this autoethnographic study, the metaphor of a river illustrates the media's impact on women's conceptions of their body/selves. Through documenting and analyzing her own experiences with media and academic discourses about body and self, the author illustrates the complexities inherent in these discourses. Stating that current language limits our abilities to conceptualize our bodies and selves in healthy ways, the author introduces the term body/self as a more encompassing descriptor of the experiences she explores in this text. The author's findings challenge her previously held belief that knowledge-based prevention programming for disordered eating can effectively protect adolescent girls and women from the patriarchal discourses of femininity that they are swimming in. She puts forth the idea that resistance to these discourses must be a community activity and encourages activities for adolescent girls and adult women that foster feelings of physical groundedness and embodied wholeness.