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Coloring Weight Stigma: On Race, Colorism, Weight Stigma, and the Failure of Additive Intersectionality

Coloring Weight Stigma: On Race, Colorism, Weight Stigma, and the Failure of Additive... America’s obsession with obesity has spawned increasing amounts of research examining how body size shapes social outcomes. Generally, body size negatively correlates with these outcomes, with larger people suffering lower self-esteem, marriage rates, and wages. However, these outcomes are unevenly distributed among racial groups, as black people counterintuitively seem robust to many of the ravages of weight discrimination. Understanding why black people do not suffer a “double burden” where weight is concerned has baffled social scientists using basic models of intersectionality to explain outcomes. The author attempts to deepen understanding of intersectionality and the structure of race in the United States by examining the combined effect of body size and skin tone or color on individual income for black Americans. The author finds that light-skinned black Americans suffer an obesity income penalty similar to white Americans, whereas medium- and dark-skinned black Americans seem to suffer no obesity income penalty. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Sociology of Race and Ethnicity SAGE

Coloring Weight Stigma: On Race, Colorism, Weight Stigma, and the Failure of Additive Intersectionality

Reece, Robert L.
Sociology of Race and Ethnicity , Volume 5 (3): 13 – Jul 1, 2019
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Publisher
SAGE
Copyright
© American Sociological Association 2018
ISSN
2332-6492
eISSN
2332-6506
DOI
10.1177/2332649218795185
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

America’s obsession with obesity has spawned increasing amounts of research examining how body size shapes social outcomes. Generally, body size negatively correlates with these outcomes, with larger people suffering lower self-esteem, marriage rates, and wages. However, these outcomes are unevenly distributed among racial groups, as black people counterintuitively seem robust to many of the ravages of weight discrimination. Understanding why black people do not suffer a “double burden” where weight is concerned has baffled social scientists using basic models of intersectionality to explain outcomes. The author attempts to deepen understanding of intersectionality and the structure of race in the United States by examining the combined effect of body size and skin tone or color on individual income for black Americans. The author finds that light-skinned black Americans suffer an obesity income penalty similar to white Americans, whereas medium- and dark-skinned black Americans seem to suffer no obesity income penalty.

Journal

Sociology of Race and Ethnicity – SAGE

Published: Jul 1, 2019

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