| Description |
In light of rampant body shame, disordered eating, physical inactivity, and widespread misunderstanding of what constitutes a healthy body, it is crucial to identify mechanisms by which women can resist distorted health discourse and redefine health for themselves outside of appearance-oriented ideals. Through following a group of 42 women ages 18-35 as they engaged in a health and media literacy curriculum developed for this study, and by using critical feminist methods to analyze participants' responses to open-ended surveys before, during, and 2 weeks after completing the curriculum, this study seeks to identify effective means for resisting appearance-focused health ideals. Through the development of a practical and accessible healthy media literacy curriculum and analysis of participants' self-reported beliefs and behaviors throughout the process, this project contributes praxis-oriented research to assist scholars, health educators, and individual women in cultivating and promoting resistance to distorted health discourse. The findings of this study also suggest that women who engage with a healthy media curriculum can develop and cultivate strategies to resist distorted health discourse by writing body image narratives that bear witness to their own lived experiences. |
