Journal abstract

Zivkovic, T., Warin, M., Davies, M., & Moore, V. (2010). In the name of the child: The gendered politics of childhood obesity. Journal of Sociology, 46(4), 375-392.

Objectives

There is growing concern about obesity rates in the United States. Both media and gender are relevant to obesity.  Gendered politics are products of, and impacts upon behavior, and are linked to socially constructed beliefs and attitudes. Given the relevance of both media and gender, a problem arises as to how to define the most appropriate relationship between children and mothers. This relationship has become the center of moral conversations around childhood obesity involving conflicting elements of innocence, responsibility, and risk and danger. The link between individualized responsibility, mothering and child politics highlights how gender is a trivial factor yet centrally implicated in policies and debates related to obesity. It also shows how models of neoliberal governance focus on the State and decentralized forms of power in their efforts to manage obesity. The objective of the paper is to investigate how ‘the child’ is positioned in obesity debates by examining the association between childhood obesity, mothering and child neglect.

Methods

The authors use media content analysis as the research methodology.  The method entails the systematic deconstruction of pieces of media with the purpose of determining common themes and effects.  The authors use print media to determine its representation of obesity and parenting. They examine the reporting of obesity in three Australian newspapers: Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian, and The Advertiser.  The newspapers were published between 1 January 2009 and 31 March 2009. The three are metropolitan newspapers with a relatively larger audience in Australia.  The authors conducted a manual search of 181 articles.  Five search terms were used:  obesity, child, parenting, eating, and diet.  A thematic analysis was then conducted on text and visual images collected. 

Results

The results show that childhood obesity is a major topic making up approximately half of articles on obesity. A large portion of these articles focuses on parent’s role in controlling and curbing children’s appetite and food choices. The results confirm earlier findings that parents are being blamed for obese children and that there is a central discourse of gender that is common in the media. The print media reproduced a clear gender differences through highlighting the role of maternal responsibility more than paternal responsibility, accentuating women’s roles in the domestic sphere and a division of labor.  Obese and overweight children are discussed more regularly compared to obese and overweight adult. Mothers are consistently singled out in these discussions. Although articles frequently refer to ‘parents’ in general, the personal reference to mothers and the notable absence of fathers sometimes including mothers’ names and photos, demonstrates that the term ‘parents’ often serves as a euphemism for maternal parents. Accordingly, the results show the gendered nature of parenting and a clear representation of ‘the child’ as a innocent beings suffering from mothers’ failures to provide healthy food.

Conclusions

There are serious implications for mothers in public’s understanding of obesity. Both parents are primarily culpable, both morally and legally, for childhood obesity. Particular attention should be drawn to the cultural assumptions and ideologies that shape the perception of mothers as well as their responsibilities and relationship to children. The authors suggest that a mother’s perceived failure to discipline and regulate her children’s bodies’ impacts the legal regulation and authoritarian of private lives through State mechanisms.

References

Zivkovic, T., Warin, M., Davies, M., & Moore, V. (2010). In the name of the child: The gendered politics of childhood obesity. Journal of Sociology, 46(4), 375-392.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in nursing essay help USA if you need a similar paper you can place your order from custom college papers.