Fa(t)shion Rhetorics
Fa(t)shion Rhetorics investigates how fat fashion bloggers make meaning through their dress practices in rhetorical, material, and embodied ways. This project extends work around feminist and queer issues of embodiment, fat, and dress. I argue for a methodology of “ethical reading” where a viewer must acknowledge their own positionality, and engage with bodies both materially and rhetorically. I enact this methodology by video-interviewing three self-identified fat fashion bloggers in three different countries. My research demonstrates how meaning can be made through clothing and the fat body itself in order to embody “fat” in diverse ways, including radical, queer, traditional, and heteronormative.
In Chapter 1, “Introduction,” I position my project in relation to the discipline of rhetoric and composition, drawing from work in visual and material rhetorics as well as embodied notions of writing. I also offer a background of the meaning of “fat” contextualized within Joanne Eicher’s definition of dress, as well as an overview of the term in the context of the fat acceptance movement.
In Chapter 2, “Situating Fat Rhetorics,” I propose a theoretical framework for ethical reading and fat rhetorics. I do this by discussing my own experiences in coming to embody fat as an orientation in three steps: feeling external forces, looking inward, and reacting. I further explain both ethical reading and fat rhetorics by drawing on the work of Sara Ahmed, Marilyn Wann, Michael Warner, Gloria Anzaldua, and Barbra Dickson.
In Chapter 3, “Introduction to the Bloggers,” I introduce the three bloggers Mary, Lolly, and Ashley. I give an overview of their blogs and include video of each participant describing herself as a blogger. I outline why I chose to focus on fat fashion bloggers for the project, and how I found the bloggers. I discuss my choice to engage in interviews in the context of ethical reading—the need to do more than look at the static text on their blogs.
In Chapter 4, “Fat as Embodied Dis/Orientation,” I use the participants’ stories (both video and text) to make the same moves as Chapter 2: external, internal, and reaction. In this first of two data chapters, I show how the participants came to know that they were fat by being told by others, seeing pictures of themselves, and then reacting to the disorientating moment of realizing that they were “other”.
In Chapter 5, “Fa(t)shion,” I discuss how the bloggers embody fat through the materiality of their dress practices, focusing on clothing and its relation to the fat body. In this chapter I do a rhetorical analysis of both the blog posts mentioned by the bloggers as well as their descriptions and discussion of their clothing in the interviews in order to show how material objects can be used to embody fat. This chapter illustrates the multiple ways that fat rhetorics can be performed and further develops the notion of ethical reading.
In Chapter 6 “Implications and Afterward,” I synthesize how my framework for understanding fat as an embodied orientation introduces a new lens on the material as it relates to the body and embodiment. This chapter also sketches out future publications and projects that emerge from this work.
In Chapter 1, “Introduction,” I position my project in relation to the discipline of rhetoric and composition, drawing from work in visual and material rhetorics as well as embodied notions of writing. I also offer a background of the meaning of “fat” contextualized within Joanne Eicher’s definition of dress, as well as an overview of the term in the context of the fat acceptance movement.
In Chapter 2, “Situating Fat Rhetorics,” I propose a theoretical framework for ethical reading and fat rhetorics. I do this by discussing my own experiences in coming to embody fat as an orientation in three steps: feeling external forces, looking inward, and reacting. I further explain both ethical reading and fat rhetorics by drawing on the work of Sara Ahmed, Marilyn Wann, Michael Warner, Gloria Anzaldua, and Barbra Dickson.
In Chapter 3, “Introduction to the Bloggers,” I introduce the three bloggers Mary, Lolly, and Ashley. I give an overview of their blogs and include video of each participant describing herself as a blogger. I outline why I chose to focus on fat fashion bloggers for the project, and how I found the bloggers. I discuss my choice to engage in interviews in the context of ethical reading—the need to do more than look at the static text on their blogs.
In Chapter 4, “Fat as Embodied Dis/Orientation,” I use the participants’ stories (both video and text) to make the same moves as Chapter 2: external, internal, and reaction. In this first of two data chapters, I show how the participants came to know that they were fat by being told by others, seeing pictures of themselves, and then reacting to the disorientating moment of realizing that they were “other”.
In Chapter 5, “Fa(t)shion,” I discuss how the bloggers embody fat through the materiality of their dress practices, focusing on clothing and its relation to the fat body. In this chapter I do a rhetorical analysis of both the blog posts mentioned by the bloggers as well as their descriptions and discussion of their clothing in the interviews in order to show how material objects can be used to embody fat. This chapter illustrates the multiple ways that fat rhetorics can be performed and further develops the notion of ethical reading.
In Chapter 6 “Implications and Afterward,” I synthesize how my framework for understanding fat as an embodied orientation introduces a new lens on the material as it relates to the body and embodiment. This chapter also sketches out future publications and projects that emerge from this work.
