The "childhood obesity epidemic": health crisis or social construction?
There has been a meteoric rise over the past two decades in the medical research and media coverage of the so-called global childhood obesity epidemic. Recently, in response to this phenomenon, there has been a spate of books and articles in the fields of critical sociology and cultural studies that have argued that this "epidemic" is socially constructed, what Natalie Boero (2007) dubs a "postmodern epidemic." As an anthropologist who has studied child nutrition and obesity in relation to poverty and the school environment, I am concerned about both the lack of reflexivity among medical researchers as well as critical scholars' treatment of the problem as entirely socially constructed. In this article I present both sides of this debate and then discuss how wee can attempt to navigate a middle course that recognizes this health issue but also offers alternative approaches to those set by the biomedical agenda.
Moffat
Tina
T
Department of Anthropology McMaster University.
D000293:Adolescent; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002170:Canada / Q000453:epidemiology; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006291:Health Policy; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D009765:Obesity / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000523:psychology; D050177:Overweight / Q000145:classification; D011287:Prejudice; D012307:Risk Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D009626:Terminology as Topic; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology