The making of fat erotics: the cultural work and pleasures of gordibuena activists

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the last decade, the term gordibuena has received increasing attention in Spanish-speaking social media outlets, and several fat activists have used the term to establish digital archives that promote fat Latina visibility. Gordibuena cultural production includes art, photography, music, books, YouTube videos, and daily Instagram selfies that celebrate the sensuality of fat Latinas. Using what I call “rasquache digital ethnography,” I read gordibuena cultural work as a transnational case study that helps fat studies scholars understand the complexities and ambivalence of fat racialized flesh and activism. I argue that gordibuena cultural work creates what I call “gordibuena erotics,” a mode of “pleasure activism” that centers fat sensuality as an affective register for change.