‘This big bum thing has taken over the world’: Considering black women’s changing views on body image and the role of celebrity

Abstract

Based on a small-scale project that explores racial distinctions in women’s attitudes towards weight loss and dieting, this article considers black women’s changing understandings of beauty and body image, and in particular young black women’s desire for a ‘slim-thick’ look. This is a body shape that brings together aspects of black and white beauty, seen to be embodied by Kim Kardashian, due to her full-figured bottom and thighs, and her very petite waist. The article argues that Kim Kardashian has been an important influence in shaping young women’s notions of attractiveness, by encouraging a common concept of body image and desirability across racial groups. Indeed, operating as an ‘exotic other’, who sits somewhere between black and white beauty, Kim Kardashian and the ‘slim-thick’ ideal perhaps offer an example of cultural assimilation, and yet they also work to exaggerate cultural stereotypes, encouraging a notion of beauty that is unrealistic, and far outside the reach of ordinary women.

Celebrity habitus, confessional style: Self-reflective bodily instruction in Khloé Kardashian’s Strong Looks Better Naked

“…This is illustrated through lengthy hair extensions, hourglass figures exaggerated through tight, fashionable designer clothing, sky-high heels, huge eyes encircled with dramatically heavy makeup, and darkly tanned skin' (2014: 51). As such, a significant degree of the academic commentary focuses upon the Kardashian/Jenners in relation to media representations of their bodies (Scheiner McClain 2014;Sastre 2014;Monteverde 2016;Appleford 2016;Cobb 2016;Sood, Quintal and Phau, 2017).…”

Diasporic Experiences of Everyday Multiculturalism: Navigating Race and Space Through African Women's Beauty Practices

“…This enduring cultural image has created the ideology of the 'thick black woman' that constructs black women as naturally curvy and voluptuous. Accordingly, constructing and normalizing ideologies about black women's bodies as naturally voluptuous have upheld gendered racial inequalities (Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2003;Gentles-Peart 2016;Shaw, 2006;Appleford, 2016). Furthermore, fashion has been considered a powerful beauty practice and tool to discipline the body, as well as validate and exemplify the nation's identity (Barnes & Eicher, 1992).…”