What Is Eating Latin American Women Writers: Food, Weight, and Eating Disorders

There is presently an immense scholarly interest in Latin American female literary production, specifically on the subject of the body. Latin American publications on weight and eating disorders abound, especially in the fields of psychology and sociology. However, there are only a few articles addressing these themes in the fictional work of Latin American women authors. What Is Eating Latin American Women Writers fills a theoretical void because it speaks to an ever-growing interest in Latin American literature about women, food, and the body. This study not only traces for the first time the historical development of the topics of food, eating consumption, and body image but also features well-known authors and others who are yet to be discovered in United States. The book contributes to the ongoing critical dialogue about women and food by offering an analysis of food, weight, and eating disorders in Latin American and Latina literary production. It demonstrates that since the 1990s, authors have been expanding the subject of food by exploring its connection to the social and cultural pressures associated with the postmodern obsession with the thin body. The texts in What Is Eating Latin American Women Writers are examined with an interdisciplinary critical approach that considers cultural, sociological, psychoanalytic, and feminist theories. It takes into consideration the specificity of Latin American cultures and it combines Latin American theories with those brought forth by North American and European critics in an effort to account more accurately for the idiosyncratic manifestations presently occurring in Latin American writings.