{"title":"Psychologizing childhood in the reality show Biggest Loser","authors":"Magnus Kilger","doi":"10.1075/ni.21084.kil","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"\n Obesity and overweight are central issues in contemporary western societies, and the public debates in media are\n extensive. This paper investigates stories from participants in the reality TV-show Biggest Loser, and how the participants invoke\n temporal identity changes and childhood traumas to produce discursively accepted narratives about the causes for being obese. This\n study analyses personal stories about being overweight, and narratives of living a life of obesity. The findings illustrate\n narrative trajectories in personal stories used to explain overweight within a contemporary therapeutic discourse, and how the\n participants use chronology and childhood as narrative resources to explain their obesity. These narratives do not only produce\n preferred explanatory narrative elements, but also highlight that a number of psychologized explanatory storylines must be used in\n order to produce a culturally valid and discursively accepted personal obesity-narrative.","PeriodicalId":46671,"journal":{"name":"Narrative Inquiry","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9000,"publicationDate":"2022-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Narrative Inquiry","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1075/ni.21084.kil","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Obesity and overweight are central issues in contemporary western societies, and the public debates in media are
extensive. This paper investigates stories from participants in the reality TV-show Biggest Loser, and how the participants invoke
temporal identity changes and childhood traumas to produce discursively accepted narratives about the causes for being obese. This
study analyses personal stories about being overweight, and narratives of living a life of obesity. The findings illustrate
narrative trajectories in personal stories used to explain overweight within a contemporary therapeutic discourse, and how the
participants use chronology and childhood as narrative resources to explain their obesity. These narratives do not only produce
preferred explanatory narrative elements, but also highlight that a number of psychologized explanatory storylines must be used in
order to produce a culturally valid and discursively accepted personal obesity-narrative.
期刊介绍:
Narrative Inquiry is devoted to providing a forum for theoretical, empirical, and methodological work on narrative. Articles appearing in Narrative Inquiry draw upon a variety of approaches and methodologies in the study of narrative as a way to give contour to experience, tradition, and values to next generations. Particular emphasis is placed on theoretical approaches to narrative and the analysis of narratives in human interaction, including those practiced by researchers in psychology, linguistics and related disciplines.