Self-acceptance and a great body image is about resisting the "beauty myth standards" that society has created and celebrating the unique qualities each of us possess.
Body Outlaws: Rewriting The Rules of Beauty and Body Image
Copyright©2006 Sure Woman.com
It seems like tall, thin and blonde and takes a beating every time the body image issue comes up, but the truth is women seeking to celebrate their own unique beauty have nothing against this most upheld image. Blessings to what you were born with. Work whatever you have. What women have issue with is when it is held up as the only acceptable standard of beauty, and that same standard is exaggerated beyond proportions. Women don't want what they should look like presented to them. Most women want to define their own definition of beauty and celebrate being, fat, skinny, short, in-between brown, or any of the rainbow of combinations that exist in the real world.
This acceptance of "the real me" is what this book Body Outlaws: Rewriting The Rules of Beauty and Body Image (third edition, January 2004) is about...It's about saying goodbye to the limited confines of body image that society glories and expects most women to fit into. With 28 essays from a diverse bunch of women - black, white and Jewish, Filipino-European and East Indian, this book is funny, poignant, sad, and angry and all the other emotions women feel when they talk about body image and its relation to identity.
Although, notably, "The Butt: Its Politics, Its Profanity, Its Power" by Erin J. Aubry - which is a funny look at the role the butt plays in African American Culture and "My Jewish Nose" by Lisa Jervis are a few of the more enjoyable essays, the majority of essays take a funny and, sometimes, self-deprecating and celebratory look at women and their love-hate relationship with their bodies.
Self-acceptance and a great body image is about resisting the "beauty myth standards" that society has created and celebrating the unique qualities each of us possess. In her introduction, the Editor Ophria Edut says, "Self acceptance is not defeat. It's a way of plugging ourselves into the organic process of life. It's the entrance ramp of discovering our true power, which is rooted in who we are. When our bodies and identity are in tune, they reflect each other. This beautiful synchronicity hums with an energy that affects everything and everyone it touches. It changes the culture."
Body Outlaws is a celebration of beauty in all of its glorious forms and a tribute to prominent backsides, rounded bellies and imperfect noses, or whatever body you were blessed with...
Copyright ©2006 Sure Woman.com/Dawn Prince
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