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Cited by 17Eating Disorders and BehaviorsFood, Nutrition, and Cultural PracticesNutrition, Health and Food Behavior

Distinct and Untamed: Articulating Bulimic Identities

Eli, Karin·2018·Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry
DOI 10.1007/s11013-017-9545-8
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Abstract

Bulimia nervosa and anorexia nervosa are inextricably linked, with substantial clinical and epidemiological overlaps. Yet, while anorexia has been analyzed extensively in medical anthropology, bulimia remains under-theorized. This is, perhaps, because, compared to self-starvation, binge eating presents a logic of practice that is difficult to reconcile with culturally reified notions of self-control, transcendence, and hard work. Thus, although anthropologists have analyzed anorexic subjectivities as imbued with a sense of cleanliness and purity, moral superiority, and heroics, similar analyses have not been extended to bulimic subjectivities; instead, bulimia has been subsumed, as a tangential disorder, into analyses of anorexia. In this paper, I aim to move bulimic identities from the margins to the centre of anthropological analysis. Based on participant narratives, I analyze bulimic identity as articulated by six Israeli women who identified as bulimic and received treatment for bulimia. The women's narratives show that bulimic identity is aligned with concepts of distinct selfhood. For these women, to be bulimic was to be framed as 'abnormal'; but this 'abnormality', albeit a source of social stigma and shame, held meanings that went beyond pathology. Through the claiming of bulimic identity, the women positioned themselves as untamed, non-conforming subjects, who acted against gendered and classed expectations-and even against the limitations of the body. Their constructions of bulimic distinction highlight the need for anthropological work that situates bulimia not as a footnote to anorexia, but as a structurally and culturally meaningful condition in its own right.

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Research works printed but not linked: 3

  1. Brooks, Anna, Amanda LeCouteur, and Julie Hepworth 1998 Accounts of Experiences of Bulimia: A Discourse Analytic Study. International Journal of Eating Disorders 24(2): 193205.
  2. Lavis, Anna 2011 The Boundaries of a Good Anorexic: Exploring pro-Anorexia on the Internet and in the Clinic. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Goldsmiths, University of London.
  3. Mitchell, Allyson 2005 Pissed off. In Fat: The Anthropology of an Obsession. Kulick, Don and Meneley, Anne, Eds. New York: Penguin: 211-25.

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Authors
Eli, K.
Affiliations
University of Oxford (GB)
Corresponding author
Eli, Karin
ORCID
Eli, Karin
Venue
Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Published
2017-08-22
Volume
42
Issue
1
Pages
159-179
ISSN
  • 0165-005X (ISSN-L)
  • 1573-076X
DOI
10.1007/s11013-017-9545-8
OpenAlex
W2746354560
Cited by
17
References
58
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 1 · 2019: 3 · 2018: 2 · 2013: 1
FWCI
2.03
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
www.springer.com/tdm (unspecified)
Locations
  • Culture Medicine and Psychiatry (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Warwick Research Archive Portal (University of Warwick) (submittedVersion)
Funders
Oxford University Press (GB) John Fell Research Fund
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Eating Disorders and Behaviors
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Food Science › Food, Nutrition, and Cultural Practices
  • Health Sciences › Nursing › Nutrition and Dietetics › Nutrition, Health and Food Behavior
Keywords
bulimia nervosa, anorexia nervosa, binge eating, self-control, abnormality, social stigma, shame, gender expectations, body, eating disorders, Israeli women, medical anthropology
MeSH terms
Adult, Female, Humans, Israel, Qualitative Research, Bulimia Nervosa, Personal Narratives as Topic

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