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Title: | ‘We're just like Gok, but in reverse’: Ana Girls – empowerment and resistance in digital communities |
Authors: | Crowe, N Watts, M |
Keywords: | Pro-Ana;Pro-Mia;online transgression;adolescent voice |
Issue Date: | 9-Jan-2014 |
Publisher: | Taylor and Francis |
Citation: | Nic Crowe & Mike Watts (2016) ‘We're just like Gok, but in reverse’: Ana Girls – empowerment and resistance in digital communities, International Journal of Adolescence and Youth, 21 (3), pp. 379 - 390, doi: 10.1080/02673843.2013.856802. |
Abstract: | Copyright © 2013 Taylor & Francis. ‘Pro-Ana’ Internet sites can foster or celebrate anorexia and bulimia nervosa in young women. Clinical discourse portrays anorexia as a problematic and deviant ‘condition’, while Pro-Ana/-Mia spaces offer an arena that appeals to control over how bodies are represented. We draw on data from a seven-year ethnographic study of young people’s online worlds, from forums, postings on Pro-Ana sites and online interviews with Pro-Ana users, to illustrate and illuminate young women’s perspectives and the extent to which this transgressive movement strives for voice. We argue that ‘being’ Pro-Ana offers ‘practitioners’ liberation from cultural critiques of the body. The websites suggest that famously thin women, whose ‘beauty’ has already been culturally validated, have overcome similar problems to Pro-Ana readers, and offer a re-formulation of cultural identities to provide legitimate (and validated) means to reach this ‘perfection’. In this respect, they represent important sites of agency and resistance. |
Description: | International Journal of Adolescence and Youth is a peer-reviewed open access journal. [Note from DOAJ (https://doaj.org/toc/2164-4527) - This journal began publishing in open access in 2014. This journal uses a CC BY or a CC BY-NC license.] |
URI: | https://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/9755 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1080/02673843.2013.856802 |
ISSN: | 0267-3843 |
Appears in Collections: | Dept of Education Research Papers |
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