The Body Project

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Joan Jacobs Brumbergs book, The Body Project An Intimate History of American Girls, is an inspiring, eloquent survey of the societal and psychological changes that have effectively molded and shaped young girls during the past hundred years. Her insight into Victorian culture and the succeeding eras citing historical sources, unpublished diaries of adolescent girls and photographs tells of a history thats crucial to us all American girls are in crisis. And its not just a temporary, teenage kind of thing.

The Body Project ventures beyond weight-control issues. Using numerous diaries from the 180s on, Brumberg discusses acne treatments, orthodontia, contact lenses, body piercing, plastic surgery and more. The whole body, including ones bikini line, is now the central personal project of the American girl.

Brumberg sees the body as a kind of message board that girls manipulate fiercely in their attempts to keep current with the demands of popular culture. Slim, bob-haired women of the twenties spelled out liberation from Victorian constraints; pointy-braed sweater girls of the fifties begged for movie star status; todays piercings, according to Brumberg, signify sexual liberalism and erode distinctions between the public and private with the merging of commercialismGautier, Madonna, some super models--and exhibitionism.

Now, with The Body Project, we have a way of viewing the young female body as history in a well-researched, lively study of our century. Envisioning her book as a female body, she outlines a series of biological events beginning with menarche, or first menstruation, and moving through the changing experience of female maturation chapter by chapter. Surprisingly, we learn that girls today become sexually active at about the same time their Victorian sisters first began to menstruate. Young women are now maturing more rapidly than ever before, yet their minds and emotional responses are still essentially childlike.

That new time-table is the increasingly early onset of puberty-- the average age at first menstruation has dropped from 16 in180 to 1 today, mostly because of improvements in health and nutrition.[p. 4] Brumberg believes there are sexual perils in store for adolescents with adult bodies in our sexually brutal and commercially rapacious society. But the usual suspects also figure advertisers and doctors who make huge profits from female insecurity, a media thats relentless in its worship of physical perfection and social changes that have allowed girls more sexual freedom and more independence from their mothers.

Society has come to believe in the perfectibility of the body, and girls are bearing the brunt of this social change, says Brumberg, In this post-virginal world, they are experiencing the pressure of appearance up keep from almost every angle Technology, economics, medicine, advertising, family life, consumerism, all of which are pushing the idea that the body is more important than the mind.[p.8]

Brumberg argues that the process of sexual maturation is more difficult for girls today than it was a century ago because of a set of historical changes that have resulted in a peculiar mismatch between girls biology and todays culture.She identifies a significant development over the course of the last 100 years the age at which girls begin menstruating has dropped dramatically. As Brumberg points out, many girls today may be sexually active before the age at which their great-great-grandmothers began menstruating. However, there has been no commensurate drop in the age of psychological development. Consequently, girls are running a much greater risk of becoming sexually active before they are emotionally prepared for it. [p.6]

This situation is exacerbated by the gradual relaxing of societal safeguards for adolescent

girls. Girls not only mature earlier, but they are granted a greater amount of independence at an earlier age. In the half-decade since the end of World War II, adolescents and teenagers have made significant advances in personal purchasing power. Consequently, many girls receive more guidance from the marketing strategies of major corporations than from family members. The problem, of course, is that these corporations have agendas of their ownspecifically, selling products. Hence, not only advertisements, but even teen-focused magazines that are supported by advertising have a vested interest in focusing girls attention on improving their appearance.[p.48]

Growing up has never been easy for girls, but it is more prolonged and perilous than ever before. Puberty can begin as early as eight; first sexual intercourse commonly occurs between 15 and 17; and women remain single and sexually active into their middle or late twenties. Forty-five percent of women who came of age in the 150s and '60s were still virgins at age 1, and for many of those 1-year-old women, their first sexual intercourse occurred on their wedding night. But only 17 percent of women who came of age in the 170s and '80s were virgins at 1. Since many Generation X women postpone marriage until their late twenties, few, if any are likely to be virgins on their wedding night. As a consequence, girls are exposed to the problems associated with unmarried sex at an earlier age and for a longer period of time than a generation ago.

[www.theamericanenterprise.org - p.]

Young girls are now at greater risk for early and traumatic sexualization. According to Brumberg, there have also been dramatic shifts in the social controls governing the sexuality of adolescent girls. Professional providers of contraceptive and abortion services have replaced mothers as the main source of authority on sexual matters.[p.185] This shift has contributed to the demoralization of female sexuality and the decline in chastity. Brumberg is critical of the medicalization of girls' sexuality, with its emphasis on sexual health and

self-management. This places an unsupportable burden on young girls to protect themselves.[p.10] It also neglects girls' emotional needs for affiliation and affection, as well as their desire to have their sexuality invested with some larger meaning.

A hundred years ago, women were lacing themselves into corsets and teaching their daughters to do the same. The ideal of the day, however, was inner beauty a focus on good deeds and a pure heart. Today American women have more social choices and personal freedom than ever before. But fifty-three percent of our girls are dissatisfied with their bodies by the age of thirteen, and many begin a pattern of weight obsession and dieting as early as eight or nine.Why?

In The Body Project, Brumberg answers this question, drawing on diary excerpts and media images from 180 to the present. Tracing girls attitudes toward topics ranging from breast size and menstruation to hair, clothing, and cosmetics, she exposes the shift from the Victorian concern with inner beauty to our modern focus on outward appearance--in particular, the desire to be model-thin and sexy. She believes that someone who wants to lose weight in order to be a changed and better person outwardly--to fit [her] inner self, has substituted internal controls for the external controls of years past, like corsets and Victorian morality.[p.xxi]

Brumberg meticulously documents the downward slide of girls' aspirations and ambitions over the past century, from improving one's character through good works to improving one's body through grueling workouts. According to one survey, the number-one wish among young women, outranking the desire to end homelessness, poverty, or racism, is to get and stay thin.[http//therapeuticresources.com]

Brumberg's phrase bad body fever refers to the fact that U.S. girls today are facing intensified growing-up problems without the cultural support system that has existed in the past. Brumberg explained her theories on the dangers facing modern American girls, saying the first is what she terms brain drain. A girl who is constantly looking at herself in the mirror is probably not going to develop the kind of creativity, skills and intellect she needs to sustain her, said Brumberg. Another major threat is sexual victimization. Girls who dont like themselves, who feel ugly, are more susceptible to manipulation and abuse, she said. They want to be wanted so badly that they dont make very good choices. The commercialization and exploitation of sexuality are strong contributing factors. There is a deep female beauty imperative here. We are a fat-phobic society, and smart kids pick this up, she said.

Fashion magazines, which girls begin to read at age nine or ten and continue to consult well into their 0s, provoke body shame. Virtually all these magazines send one clear message Your body is a mess. For example, the cover of the December 17 Jump, a magazine for young teens, features stories entitled, Body Bummers How to go from feeling flawed to fab and Sizing up boobs. Such magazines tell girls to like themselves, whatever their size or shape, but they only feature flat-chested models who are six feet tall and 105 pounds. Girls respond to body shame with rigid technocratic monitoring of their bodies. Again, the strenuous pursuit of feminine virtue has not disappeared but shifted location. The virtue of staying sexually pure has been replaced by the virtue of staying physically fit. [p.1]

Brumberg recommends that we put the emphasis on what female bodies can do, rather than what they look like. Where do we draw the line between healthy and unhealthy attention to appearance? How can we confront and counter the messages girls receive about the importance of good looks? Do we need to explicitly discuss our values about appearance and beauty or is it enough to emphasize other aspects of girls lives, such as athletic, musical, artistic, and intellectual abilities? According to Brumberg, At the close of the twentieth century, the female body poses an enormous problem for American girls. . . because of the culture in which we live [p. xvii]. How did forces outside the family become so influential? How can families regain their central role in educating and advising daughters about puberty and sexuality, while acknowledging the influence of modern medicine, consumer products, and the media?

Brumberg encourages a new era of advocacy for girls, yet some argue that focusing on the special needs of girls puts them at risk for discrimination. Girls need equal rights, some people maintain, not protection. Do girls in our culture need more protection and guidance than boys? What are the risks in protecting girls? What is to be gained? What is the difference between protection and girl advocacy as Brumberg describes it? What forms should advocacy take? [p.08, 10]

Brumberg wants adults to help them forge a new code of sexual ethics. In Girl Advocacy Again, she asserts that girls who hate their bodies do not make good decisions about partners, or about the kind of sexual activity that is in their best interest. This leads to date rape, teenage pregnancy and girls being sexually exploited rather than sexually expressive in a postvirginal age.[p.1]

Brumbergs new moral code would preserve personal freedom and expression. But its a difficult task, because many adults are as steeped in the culture as adolescents. As Brumberg herself says, at least in middle-class America, girls grow up hearing adult women

talk about how much they hate their own thighs. girls are at greater risk of being

exploited or abused by young men who have no sense of gallantry or protectiveness toward women. Young women are freer, but it's not clear they are happier or more secure than previous generations.[p.01] Although, taking a wordly perspective, we, american women, should be grateful.

Resources

The Body Project An Intimate History of American Girl by Joan Jacobs Brumberg

The Nation Digital Edition http//www.thenation.com

Copyright (c) 17, The Nation Company, L.P. All rights reserved.

http//www.therapeuticresources.com/6-8text.html

http//www.salon.com/mothers/mamafesto.html

Museum of menstruation and women's health

http//www.mum.org/poemdir.htm

http//www.theamericanenterprise.org/taejf8i.htm

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