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"Big, Black and Beautiful Women: Health at Every Size Offers a New Paradigm" New Chapter

PROFESSOR WRITES ANOTHER CHAPTER 

THIS TIME IN BLACK CULTURE BOOK

Alabama State University communications professor Dr. Rev. E.K. Daufin is the author of a chapter in a new book, “Black Culture and Experience: Contemporary Issues,” published by Peter Lang Publishing.

Daufin’s chapter is “Big, Black, and Beautiful Women: Health at Every Size Offers a New Paradigm.”

The book, which will be out later this year, is about the African-American culture and other issues impacting the black community.

Daufin is a national expert about weight as well as race, gender and class in the media. Her chapter stresses that you don’t have to be thin to be healthy and that the “war on obesity” is just another war on those who are already the most stigmatized and discriminated against – predominantly African-American women.  Her chapter offers a new paradigm – HAES or Health At Every Size, which she argues is a more effective and compassionate alternative to weight loss, dieting, exercise and surgery. It encompasses self-acceptance, moving and eating for pleasure according to internal cues of hunger, satiety and appetite.

An educator, performance artist and a social activist, Daufin is the founder of Love Your Body; Love Yourself workshops. Her work has been published in several academic journals, newspapers and magazines, and she has a chapter in five other anthologies. Daufin also has been featured on radio and television programs. She is a columnist for the international nonprofit Association for Size Diversity And Health's online "HAES(R) Matters” and an officer of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication’s (AEJMC) Minorities And Communication Division. Daufin presented research on media and women in the “Black Power Movement” and moderated a panel on race and entertainment media this month at the AEJMC annual convention in San Francisco.

Daufin graduated from The Ohio State University where she earned her Ph.D. in mass communication and film.

ASU Professor writes chapter in new book about ‘Fat Acceptance’

Re: ASU professor writes chapter in new book about ‘Fat Acceptance’
Date: Jan.  15, 2015

ASU Professor writes chapter in new book about ‘Fat Acceptance’

Alabama State University communications professor Dr. Rev. E-K Daufin is the author of a chapter in a new book, “The Politics of Size: Perspectives from the Fat Acceptance Movement,” published by Praeger Publishers Inc.  

Daufin’s chapter is “Black Women in Fat Activism.” The book supplies readers a frank overview of the issues surrounding how to deal with the many levels of discrimination against fat people – and reframes the discussion about obesity from a "diet and weight loss industry driven medical issue" to a social and political one.

Daufin, a national expert about weight as well race, gender and class in the media, was invited by the editor of the book to write the chapter after seeing Daufin's works on the subject.  The chapter itself takes a look at what black women face as a result of weight stigma.

“Eighty to 90% of any person's weight is caused by genetics.  The reasons for the higher obesity rate for African-American women are also genetic, along with other factors including socioeconomics and the environment,” Daufin said, “But even more women of color are joining the front lines of activism in changing the indirectly racist ‘war on obesity' to the 'war on weight stigma' instead.”

Daufin said the essays in the book serve to correct misinformation about obesity and fat people that is commonly accepted by the general public, such as the idea that “fat” and “healthy” are mutually exclusive. Subject matter covered includes fat-friendly workplace policies; fat-dating experiences; and the intersections of being fat and also a person of color, a person with disabilities, a transgender person, or a member of another sub-group of society. 

An educator, performance artist and a social activist, Daufin is the founder of Love Your Body;Love Yourself (R) workshops. Her work has been published in several academic journals, newspapers and magazines, and she has a chapter in three other anthologies. Daufin also has been on radio and appeared on television. She is a columnist for the international non-profit Association for Size and Health Diversity's online "HAES(R) Matters." 

Daufin graduated from the Ohio State University where she earned her Ph.D. in mass communication and film.

My column in the ASDAH Thanksgiving Holiday Special

If you missed my column in the Association for Size Diversity and Health special you can view it here: http://healthateverysizeblog.org/2014/11/

HAES Business Mastermind Holiday Blog Hop Schedule

HAES Holiday Blog Hop Schedule

HAES(TM) Business Mastermind Holiday Health Blog Hop - Self-Support

HAES^TM Business Mastermind Holiday Health Blog Hop

12 December 2014

Rev. Dr. E-K. Daufin

If you HATE that song, “What do the lonely do at Christmas,”  and want to obliterate whatever device that has the audacity  to play such a melancholy tune to you during the holiday season – This Blog Hop is for you.

I don’t have a significant other (other than my dog, who is great but really….), or functional family or nearby friends who have time for me, or far away friends who even have time to talk to me very often.  So the overwhelming cultural myth of the happy extended family gatherings and romantic findings and celebrations from the last Thursday in November… to New Year’s Day, can really bring me down.  Do you feel me?

In addition to those factors, the holidays -- whether you’re a religious devotee or an atheist, have an, “eat mindlessly, stuff yourself and pledge to starve yourself come New Year’s Day,” sort of mandate that doesn’t mix with HAES^TM. 

Here are a few hints for those of us for whom the holiday just rubs in our face all the good things, people, support and connections we DON’T have in our lives that makes it even harder to be grateful for the good we DO have:

Ѽ There’s a new commercial this year whose refrain is, “Eat a snack,” sung to the tune of “(If you’re happy and you know it,) Clap your hands”. If you hear this commercial TURN IT OFF IMMEDIATELY.  Unless of course you have a clapper for the device it’s playing on, then you can actually clap your hands.  Or, if you can bear to listen all the way through just one last time, do so and note the product it promotes. Google the maker and send their consumer affairs office an email that says basically, “I’m not buying your product because of this commercial that promotes mindless eating and stuffing our emotions even if it is candy-coated in a catchy commercial tune that harkens back to my childhood. And SHAME ON YOU.”

Ѽ Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer was alone and dissed during the holidays.  But the very characteristic that made him a pariah was finally deigned by the Big Guy (Santa or insert your own deity.) to be the PERFECT one to save the day.  You’re alone, take advantage of it.  Sing Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer at the top of your lungs and dance wildly around the house, while thinking about the above.  It makes me feel better.  And even if it doesn’t work for you, if you keep doing it, you’ll get tired as heck, go to sleep, BINGO – one less day in this season to feel miserable.  No self-criticism about your voice or your body during any of these exercises, or any other time, any time of the year – is allowed.

Ѽ If you have a pet who will play with you (a dog or a cat who is ready to roll when YOU are rather than the other way around), set a timer and play with her for at least 10 minutes.  If you don’t have a pet who will play with you, or at all, do a little online research about what kind of dog would suit your circumstance (Tiny apartment? Tiny budget? Allergies?).  There’s plenty of helpful techniques online you never even thought of and you’re a blog hopper right?  Finish reading this and then hop on over there and see.  Or volunteer for your local Humane Society.  If there’s no opportunity to be trained to work with the animals until after the holidays, sign up for when it is available, put it on your calendar and do another round of Rudolf. BTW ALWAYS ADOPT. If you wonder why I say this, Google, “Why you should adopt rather than purchase a pet.”

Ѽ Okay, here’s the last one.  Write/journal about what you would be doing right now in your FANTASY relationships with ideal family, friends, lover/spouse… if you had one.  Many folk say this will help manifest these situations in your life, if you do it consistently and allow yourself to believe, the same way allow everything outside the movie you love… to slip away when you watch it. Or…just go watch one of those movies…If it’s sad you can cry, not for yourself mind you but those poor, unfortunate characters in the story.  You can laugh too if you’ve got a funny one.  Back to that manifestation thing…hasn’t worked yet for me but I’m still livin’.  So who knows?  It sure doesn’t hurt.

So maybe one of these ideas catches your fancy and works for you.  Maybe reading this reminded you of something you used to do that helped and you’re going to try it again.  May be you haven’t heard any new ideas here to make the holidays less painful for you (Sorry!  I tried!).  Remember in any case, you are not alone in your aloneness.  Many put on a good face but are not connected to the people they do have in their lives the way they appear to be or talk about.  The very reason the media messages that say everyone’s loved and in-the-loop (except me…or you) become media messages is that they reinforce a cultural myth that few if any real people have completely. 

Though others may have bigger pieces of the pie, I don’t think anyone has the whole pie.  But if you’ve been practicing mindful eating you already know that you aren’t really hungry for the whole pie, usually just a dab will do ya’.  Even if that dab looks darn far away today, keep plugging and shine that gorgeous red nose of yours.  Santa may be calling on you soon.

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Rev. Dr. E-K. Daufin is a member of the HAES^TM Business Mastermind, a HAES^TM feminist minister, performance poet, author and college professor specializing in race, gender, size and the media.