Body Culture

In Jezebel Unhinged Tamura Lomax traces the use of the jezebel trope in the Black church and in Black popular culture, showing how it is pivotal to reinforcing men's cultural and institutional power to discipline and define Black girlhood and womanhood. Drawing on writing by medieval thinkers and travelers, Enlightenment theories of race, the commodification of women's bodies under slavery, and the work of Tyler Perry and Bishop T. D. Jakes, Lomax shows how Black women are written into religious and cultural history as sites of sexual deviation.

Humans rely on body language to connect and build trust, but with most of our communication happening from behind a screen, traditional body language signals are no longer visible - or are they? In Digital Body Language, Erica Dhawan, a go-to thought leader on collaboration and a passionate communication junkie, combines cutting edge research with engaging storytelling to decode the new signals and cues that have replaced traditional body language across genders, generations, and culture.

Emily Ratajkowski is an acclaimed model and actress, an engaged political progressive, a formidable entrepreneur, a global social media phenomenon, and now, a writer. Rocketing to world fame at age 21, Ratajkowski sparked both praise and furor with the provocative display of her body as an unapologetic statement of feminist empowerment. The subsequent evolution in her thinking about our culture’s commodification of women is the subject of this book.

Sara Hendren invites us to rethink the things and settings we live with. What might assistance based on the body’s stunning capacity for adaptation—rather than a rigid insistence on “normalcy”—look like? Can we foster interdependent, not just independent, living? How do we creatively engineer public spaces that allow us all to navigate our common terrain? By rendering familiar objects and environments newly strange and wondrous, What Can a Body Do? helps us imagine a future that will better meet the extraordinary range of our collective needs and desires.

When Chrissy King first joined a gym, she had one goal in mind: to “get skinny.” In pursuit of this goal, she fell into the all-too-common cycle of “not enough-ness”; no matter what she achieved, there was always something she felt she needed to change about her body, her appearance, herself. This made her realize the most liberating truth of all: She was not the problem. The Body Liberation Project is about finding actual freedom in our bodies by discovering strength and aspects of fitness, movement, and eating that work for YOU.

All I Ever Wanted Was to Be Hot is a funny, provocative retrospective on the last thirty years of Western beauty standards. From the Pussycat Dolls to Victoria’s Secret, The Girls of the Playboy Mansion to Lara Bingle, the media of the 2000s was littered with high profile examples of hotness as the highest form of social currency. Is it any wonder a girl growing up in that era might believe “good looks” were as integral to womanhood as having a pulse?

An exploration, both personal and deeply reported, of how we learn to eat in today's toxic food culture. When her newborn daughter stopped eating after a medical crisis, Virginia Sole-Smith spent two years teaching her how to feel safe around food again - and in the process, realized just how many of us are struggling to do the same thing.

Light-years from home, it’s Ira’s second chance. Just another anonymous student at a space station university. Not the orphan whose Earther heritage was erased. Not some social experiment put on display by his adoptive father. Not the criminal recruited by the human rebels. But when Ira’s loyalties clash once again, two wars break out: one on the ground and one within himself. Which will Ira stand with? Which will take him down?

You’ve spent years trying to fix your body. What if the real healing begins when you stop fighting it? If you’ve ever looked in the mirror and felt like a project to manage—shrunk, sculpted, hidden, or improved—you’re not alone. And you’re not broken. You’ve simply been living in a world that profits from your shame. The Body Peace Project is a mindful, zero-pressure guide to unlearning that shame, rebuilding body trust, and finally feeling at home in your skin—without needing to earn it. This book offers something deeper than body love: a softer, more sustainable ...

Through interviews, research, and her own experience, Brown not only gives us the real story on weight, health, and beauty, but also offers concrete suggestions for how each of us can sort through the lies and misconceptions and make peace with and for ourselves.

Welcome to College. In case you didn't know, now is the time to lose it. NOW is the time go buck wild, to let loose, and go for broke. Everywhere you look, they're there. Hot women. Sexy, fun, experimental chicks nearing the peak of their sexual prowess. Cute and sexy girls who want nothing more than to have a little fun. Which begs only one question: What are you going to do about it? Will you sit back, being a passive wallflower who never gets the fun and sex commanded by other, more courageous guys? Will you rest on your laurels, too afraid to attract and seduce women, too scared to do ...

From debut author Jamison Shea comes this slow-burn horror novel that lifts a veil on the institutions that profit from exclusion and the toll of giving everything to a world that will never love you back. This program is read by Grammy- and Emmy-award-winning-actor Kristolyn Lloyd. There will...

Venus, maiden, wife, mother, monster — women have been bound so long by these restrictive roles, codified by patriarchal culture, that we scarcely see them. Catherine McCormack illuminates the assumptions behind these stereotypes whether writ large or subtly hidden. She ranges through Western art — think Titian, Botticelli, and Millais — and the image-saturated world of fashion photographs, advertisements, and social media, and boldly counters these depictions by turning to the work of women artists like Morisot, Ringgold, Lacy, and Walker.

A witty, wide-ranging, and surprisingly profound cultural history of the world’s most obsessed-over muscle group: the abs. From the gleaming marble torsos of ancient Greece to the sweat-soaked montages of Hollywood action heroes and the endless scroll of Instagram #fitspo, the human midsection has always commanded attention. But why do abs matter so much? What do they really say about us? And how did a patch of muscle become the world’s favorite shorthand for sex, strength, discipline, and desire? In Washboard Dreams: The Strange, Sexy, and Serious Story of Abs in Art, Faith, Fitness, ...

In Formerly Known as Food, Kristin Lawless argues that, because of the degradation of our diet, our bodies are literally changing from the inside out. The billion-dollar food industry is reshaping our food preferences, altering our brains, changing the composition of our microbiota, and even affecting the expression of our genes. Lawless chronicles how this is happening and what it means for our bodies, health, and survival. An independent journalist and nutrition expert, Lawless is emerging as the voice of a new generation of food thinkers.

In this sweeping history of popular music in the United States, NPR's acclaimed music critic examines how popular music shapes fundamental American ideas and beliefs, allowing us to communicate difficult emotions and truths about our most fraught social issues, most notably sex and race.

Understand the impact of non-verbal communication and learn to interpret & use body language effectively in business scenarios. We delves into the nuances of body language, equipping participants with the skills to build trust, exude confidence, & foster collaboration in any business setting.

Savannah is dreading being home alone with her overbearing mother after her big sister - and best friend - goes off to college. But if she can just get through senior year, she'll be able to escape to college, too. What she doesn't count on is that her mother's obsession with weight has only grown deeper since her appearance on an extreme weight-loss show, and now Savvy's mom is pressuring her even harder to be constantly mindful of what she eats.

Steve Richardson thought his biggest worries were yardwork and raising two teenagers. But after a harmless social media post spins wildly out of control, he finds himself at the center of a vicious online mob—targeted, canceled, and threatened.

This is the first academic study of sneakers and the subculture that surrounds them. Since the 1980s, American sneaker enthusiasts, popularly known as 'sneakerheads' or 'sneakerholics', have created a distinctive identity for themselves, while sneaker manufacturers such as Reebok, Puma and Nike have become global fashion brands. How have sneakers come to gain this status and what makes them fashionable?