Plus-Size Fashion Movement: Black, Latina, Asian, And Indigenous Women

Under society’s norms for decades, young women have been put under the pressure and anticipation to have perfect bodies. That is, thin and curved, beautified by applying pounds of the makeup to their face but not appear ridiculously overdone. Who’s responsible for these standards imposed on young women? When a young girl picks up the model along the cover of Vogue being called flawless, it’s easy for her to then aspire to be a real-life imitation of the photocopy. These companies produce magazine covers shown with girls’ images daily. As if keeping the perfect body wasn’t hard enough our culture also forces girls into the forever expanding world of composition, however, body image is a pressing issue for young women. Advertisements and posters of skinny female models are all over. Young girls not only could be better but need to be more upright and feel driven to throw the perfect figure. Moreover, girls are evaluated and oppressed by their physical appearances. With supplements and apparel designed to enhance a facial expression; social media, magazines, and marketing campaigns and advertisements add to the burden of perfection. The fashion industry is a prime object of body image issues, as they believe clothes look better on tall and svelte women. Established on a survey participated by 13 to 17-year-old in the U.S., 90% “felt pressured by fashion and media industries to be skinny”, with more than 60% routinely compares themselves to models, while 46%

Ophira Edut is the editor of Body Outlaws: Young Women Writing About Body Image and Identity , and Rebecca Walker created the foreword. Ophira Edut has spent almost a decade creating media projects for young adult women, and is the founding publisher of HUES ( Hear Us Emerging Sisters) which is a intersectional magazine geared toward women of different walks of life. She is also a contributor to Ms magazine which is a popular feminist magazine. Her work has been published in major magazines such as, Glamour, Sassy, Vibe, and Enertainment Weekly. This novel is a composition of personal essays of women from different social groups, ethnicities, race, and sexuality aabout their body image concerns and personal experiences. The essays cover a wide range of topics such as, The butt: its politics, its profanity , its power , by Erin J. Aubry , which is about the black women not being able to fit in and how that their bodies have become (mainly their backsides) the obsession of society and a means to shame them. Sizing myself up: tales of a plus-size model by Kate Dillon, which is about how being a plus size model is a source of empowerment for the author, and she views it as a means to change the perspective of society from “youre pretty for a big girl” to

Never Just Pictures highlights the severity of the growing eating disorder epidemic in America by relating it to the plaguing fashion industry. The values instilled by the fashion industry, according to Susan Bordo, author of this essay, desire one thing: a profit. Bordo believes it is irresponsible of the industry to remain with its back turned on the issue of eating disorders, and the essay discusses the ways they are doing so.

“Society tells girls how to look and how to act and that’s not good at all” “On late night talk shows people are more likely to hear about how thin Nicole Richie is then a fat joke abouthow heavy Queen Latifah is.” “Ideals of beauty change some what over time, but the simple fact is that proponents of plus-size preference have failed to convince America that fat is beautiful.”

Black culture has always been the more voluptuous curves in women, yet those women were considered cornbread fed and the ones who weren’t blessed with these assets, didn’t go out their way for unethical surgical practices. The social media negative influence on African American women growing up within the 21st century has made it seem the simple life is depending on the curves of your body, instead the knowledge of your mind and the power in your beliefs. Proper parenting is started at home, yet with social networks being such a part of our children’s lives, the media is also in the homes. In the process of the media influence, I believe the importance of the media understanding the black culture and the expectations of a woman’s curves also cause many medical issues that we are associated with, such as: Type I and II diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity. With overweight being accepted in most black families homes, the media and social networks should deter as much as possible from promoting the oversexed woman is the ideal woman. The effect social networks has on the children coming behind us is powerful and I believe the power of the media should be used more effectively.

The body image movement aims to improve the relationship between women and their bodies in a more positive manner (Dove 2014). Currently, women are suffering from an increase in body self-consciousness as a result of medias role regarding beauty ideals. Researchers have found that women worldwide do not view themselves as beautiful and are consistently troubled about their appearance and concluded that six out of ten girls are concerned about their appearances (Dove 2014). As a result, anxiety and self-consciousness are all contributing factors producing significant health concerns among women (Aubrey 2007). Media has developed a reputation in society for women to be held to unachievable beauty standards as they promote a “thin culture” (Hesse-Biber et al. 2006). This promotion of beauty standards has inspired the body image movement to educate and encourage women to love their bodies in order to achieve more self-esteem and confidence (Dove 2014). As well as, corporations are beginning to

The so-called “plus-size” models of the industry are skinny and in-shape; they are just curvy. Curvy does not equal plus-sized, and as the average woman is heavier than she was 20 years ago, the general population should be more represented in fashion. Lisa Hilton makes an argument saying that obesity is much more common than anorexia and eating disorders, but this has nothing to do with how the fashion industry itself influences the amount of eating disorders that there are. We know that obesity has struck America, but these people often times feel bad about being overweight and feel like they are a taboo in society. Fat shaming in media does not promote a healthy diet for women, and more clothes should be created for overweight models so that every girl can look and feel

But one of the most common controversial topics is related to body image. There are many media outlets that say that people should aim to be skinny, but then they also say the people should aim to be curvy. The media constantly contradicts itself by pitting curvy models and ideals, against skinny models and ideals. The fact is that one is not more desirable than the other, “there was a fashionable ideal (skinny) and a sexy one (curvy)” (Kimball). This message is inconsistent because it has two “ideals”. When one ideal starts to become more prominent in the media than the other, the public takes action to bring back focus to the other. Social media dictates the world of body image with such viral messages such as #curvepower and #Iamperfect. People try to support the one they find the most desirable, but the fact is they are both desirable in different ways. In some people’s eyes the media creates, “blurred boundaries between skinny and sexy” (Kimball). For some people skinny is sexy. Everyone has a different idea of perfection, some men prefer skinny and some prefer curvy. The media uses doublethink by invariably supporting two vastly different body types as being perfect and

When Victoria’s Secret is allowed to have models prance around on screen but Lane Bryant Ads (lingerie for plus size women) is banned then there’s a problem. The media is portraying these models who are thin to the point where it is unhealthy. And the media is feeding society lies. A perfect example is of Gerran Tyler. Tyler was a 12 year old supermodel. She walks the run way for clients like Marc Jacobs, Calvin Klein, and Betsey Johnson. She’s tall, thin, the perfect model because she hasn’t hit puberty yet. She walked during New York Fashion Week and posed for these designer brands advertisements. This body type is unachievable for almost all adult women (Roberts). Somebody in their twenties or thirties doesn’t have the ability to look like a twelve year old girl, but this is how these designers are telling us to look. Tyler had an amazing career and high expectations but the fame didn’t last long. As she got older and hit puberty she began to develop boobs, hips, and curves. She began getting less and less bookings. Her supermodel career was virtually over. “Eighty percent of 10-year-old American girls say they have been on a diet” and the, “Number one magic wish for young girls 11-17 is to be thinner” (Missrepresentation). This self-esteem problem with young girls is a result of these unobtainable ideas of beauty. Jennifer Siebel, creator of the documentary Missrepresentation, says

The media has distorted people’s views on the way they look at their own body image. The media has shown what their ideal body type is, while leaving people to feel as if the average weight is not good enough. (Cardosi, 2006) We live in a world where people feel as if having zero body fat is the idea body type to have. Pictures of models for clothing stores, bathing suits, lingerie etc. all exhibit to this to be true. Body image is perceived to be negatively influenced by the media and the way that the media displays their models. Parents, teachers, adolescence and even children all find themselves to be comparing themselves based on what the media exposes. (Levine & Murnen, 2009)

The Fat Acceptance Movement, formerly known as Fat Pride, Fat Power, or Fat Liberation, is an attempt at exterminating bias, criticism, and otherwise discrimination against people who are overweight or whose bodies do not fit the social norm. The movement got its face in 1967 during a protest of 500 people in New York’s Central Park, and has now spread all over the country and more recently has popped up in various areas in the UK. The Fat Acceptance Movement has made clear its goals by promoting plus sized models, adding a diversity of shape and size of actors, actresses, and characters in entertainment and arts, and pushing for laws and protections in favor of the overweight community. While the movement has benefitted both men and women, it ties in closely to feminism, and huge contributions of

A new study in the NCA’s Communication Monographs discovered that when women, who were hocked up to a heart monitor, viewed images of other women with the same or similar body type to their own. There were more reports of body positivity and less social comparison. While there is more growing awareness of plus-size models there is also starting to be more demand for plus-size clothing in more styles. When a heavier set woman goes to flip through a magazine and all they see is skinny models being portrayed as beautiful and smart, yet this starts to take a mental toll on them. Thoughts of self-discrimination can lead to low self-esteem issues. To help with these thoughts fashion industries have now started putting plus-size women on their runways, such as the Lane Bryant’s #ImNoAngle and Dove’s Real Beauty campaigns.

When researchers asked one hundred eighteen female, college-aged students to look at twenty pictures in ads from women's magazines, they felt a sudden change in mood after the pictures were observed. There was notable depression in the women, a depression that has seemed to hit many women after leafing through women's magazines (Key and Lindgren 11). This depression is due to the fact there are so many negative messages being conveyed in advertisements that are published in women's magazines. But who can blame the women for their depression anyway? When the majority of the ads in women's magazines show super-skinny models advertising nice clothes, makeup, jewelry, etc., one might find themselves to be a little down. Skinny models portray their figures to be the cultural norm in Western society today. How often does one find a model in a woman's magazine that is over a size six that is not shown advertising plus size merchandise? The answer is not very often, or sometimes never at all. If women do not see their body type being depicted in

Thicker women face discrimination and pressures from society and their peers to lose weight because their bodies types are perceived as unhealthy this is the relative idea Beth MacInnis shared in “Fat Oppression”  in Consuming Passions. MacInnis discusses the health risk associated with weight loss and the misconception thicker women are unhealthy because of their body sizes. She points out that having a bigger body other than being thin the ideal beauty standard is seen as being unhealthy but for those women to lose weights by means that are risky and are shown to be unhealthy in her research. In simpler terms MacInnis is pointing out the hypocrisy in the idea that not being thin is unhealthy but for women that aren’t skinny face actual unhealthy and unethical means to lose weight.

More recently, Sports Illustrated model, Kate Upton whom is a size 4, is now considered a plus size model and deemed to be “too curvy”. In the United States the “normal” sized woman is between the size of 6 and 10. Most of us do not understand why some put themselves through so much anguish to satisfy these body image complexes. Back in the 1950’s, models were