Routledge Handbook on Deviance by Stephen E. Brown Ophir Sefiha

Author:Stephen E. Brown,Ophir Sefiha
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

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Fat Sexuality as Deviance

Ariane Prohaska and Jeffrey R. Jones

The 2001 film Shallow Hal depicts a narcissistic man who is only attracted to thin women. Hal, played by Jack Black, is placed under a spell by world-renowned motivational speaker Tony Robbins that results in seeing inner beauty as outward appearance (Mendoza, 2009). Consequently, Hal falls in love with Rosemary, a 300-lb. woman who appears to be a 100-lb. supermodel to Hal. When Hal’s best friend is mortified by his happiness with a large woman, he breaks the spell, and Hal must decide if Rosemary’s heart is more important than her size. The audience receives the happy ending they want: Hal chooses Rosemary, perpetuating the adage that beauty is only skin deep.

The film’s comedy is often derived from fat jokes. In one particular scene, Rosemary, portrayed by the demure Gwyneth Paltrow, removes her panties and playfully tosses them at Hal. This is clearly the underwear of a large woman. The audience is reminded that sexual attraction to fat bodies, particularly those of women, is ridiculed, and in this case the sexual relationship is only occurring because of a misunderstanding about the woman’s appearance. Depictions of fat in pop culture and in scientific communities reinforce perceptions of fat women as nonsexual beings and label individuals who are attracted to fat people, particularly fat women, as deviant (e.g., Giovanelli & Ostertag, 2009).

In this chapter, we argue that fat sexuality is still regarded as deviant by the general public. However, new research on reframing the fat body and about the diverse sex lives of fat people is challenging normative conceptions of how sexuality is experienced by fat bodies in the contemporary United States (e.g., Gailey, 2014, 2012; Prohaska, 2014; Boero, 2012; Rothblum & Solovay, 2009; Sobal, 1999). In order to situate fat sexuality into the deviance literature, we (1) discuss the sexual deviance framework; (2) review literature on fat as a stigmatized identity; (3) discuss research that labels fat women as “doubly deviant”; (4) summarize the literature on the consequences of the stigmatization of fat women; and (5) highlight examples of the expanding research shaping scholarly conceptions of fat sexuality in hopes of eliminating the stigma associated with fat and attraction to fat bodies.

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