Description
Book SynopsisAmericans are generally apprehensive about what they perceive as big government—especially when it comes to measures that target their bodies. Soda taxes, trans fat bans, and calorie counts on menus have all proven deeply controversial. Such interventions, Rachel Louise Moran argues, are merely the latest in a long, albeit often quiet, history of policy motivated by economic, military, and familial concerns. In Governing Bodies, Moran traces the tension between the intimate terrain of the individual citizen''s body and the public ways in which the federal government has sought to shape the American physique over the course of the twentieth century.
Distinguishing her subject from more explicit and aggressive government intrusion into the areas of sexuality and reproduction, Moran offers the concept of the advisory state—the use of government research, publicity, and advocacy aimed at achieving citizen support and voluntary participation to realize social goal
Trade Review
"Deeply researched and engagingly written, Governing Bodies offers a nuanced and provocative account of the role of the U.S. government in managing the physical fitness of its citizens. Rachel Louise Moran provides a new perspective on American political history and state development." * Marisa Chappell, Oregon State University *
"Governing Bodies offers an authoritative and compelling account of the century-long effort to ensure that America's citizenry was physically fit. Tracing the story from the evolution of the calorimeter to warnings that Americans were a 'Nation of Weaklings' during the Cold War to WIC in the 1970s, Moran pays careful attention to the intersection of state, society, and political culture that framed this set of public policies. For much of the twentieth century, Americans were enticed, rather than coerced, into shaping up." * Brian Balogh, University of Virginia *
Table of Contents
Introduction. Weight of the Nation
Chapter 1. The Advisory State World War I Made: Scientific Nutrition and Scientific Mothering
Chapter 2. Boys into Men: Depression-Era Physique in the Civilian Conservation Corps
Chapter 3. Men into Soldiers: World War II and the Conscripted Body
Chapter 4. Selling Postwar Fitness: Advertising, Education, and the President's Council
Chapter 5. Wasted Bodies: Emaciation and the War on Poverty
Chapter 6. Poor Choices: Weight, Welfare, and WIC in the 1970s
Conclusion. Governing American Bodies
Notes
Index
Acknowledgments
