Graduation Year
2026
Document Type
Open Access Senior Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Politics and International Relations
Reader 1
Nancy Neiman
Reader 2
Kimberly Drake
Terms of Use & License Information
Rights Information
Sky R. Caldwell
Abstract
The Politics of Fatness and the Demand for Our Collective Joy aims to assess the political-economic reasonings behind the return of overt anti-fatness and its coincidence with the re-normalization of the far right. My research looks at the sudden mass marketing of GLP-1 drugs and the use of the body as a spatial fix during recession-era economic conditions. First, this interdisciplinary project asks why the body positivity movement has not been successful in the greater fight against anti-fatness. Then, through archival research, discourse analysis, ethnographic interviews, and photography, my project explores various case studies of successful spaces and collectives working towards building community outlets for fat people in the U.S. Following in the footsteps of over half a century of fat liberation activists and organizations, my research asks why it is essential to root resistance to anti-fatness in building intersectional spaces of fat joy, and argues that body positivity fails because of its reliance on racial capitalism. I argue that intrinsic in the struggle for fat liberation is the practice of what we hope to see in the future through community, care, and joy. Finally, I advocate that the deconstruction of racial capitalism and the lived practice of the future we hope to build can occur simultaneously.
Recommended Citation
Caldwell, SKy, "The Politics of Fatness and the Demand for Our Collective Joy" (2026). Scripps Senior Theses. 2750.
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/2750
