Body Politic: Government and Physique in Twentieth Century America
Open Access
- Author:
- Moran, Rachel Louise
- Graduate Program:
- History
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- June 11, 2013
- Committee Members:
- Lori D Ginzberg, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Greg Eghigian, Committee Member
Chloe Silverman, Committee Member
Lee Ann Banaszak, Committee Member
Jennifer Mittelstadt, Special Member - Keywords:
- political history
twentieth century
United States history
diet
weight
history of the human sciences
physique
body politic - Abstract:
- Although often believed to be a recent phenomenon, there is a long history of federal projects designed to shape American weight and physique. These issues have not been taken seriously because they are not obvious state interventions, but are instead part of what I define as the “Advisory State.” I conceptualize the advisory state as a repertoire of governing tools, as well as the actual use of these tools. Advisory state tools are political projects instituted not through physical force and not through coercion. Rather, these governing tools include federal research with explicit social aims, an expectation that persons and groups outside the state will voluntarily do the work asked of them by state, and the use of persuasive discourses like quantification and advertising to compel what cannot be legislated. My dissertation draws from literatures of weight and physique culture, biopolitics, and feminist body history, while refusing to separate the history of weight from the politics of American state development. Refusing this separation, and recognizing the intimate bond between the federal and the cultural, requires us to refocus our ideas about how federal policy-making works.