GENÇLİK ARAŞTIRMALARI DERGİSİ
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The Meaning of Having a Weak Body for Young People in The Context of Socio-Cultural Construction of Weakness
The nick names in the research are; Nur (21), Duru (23), Lale (19), Özlem (21), Sema (24),
Burcu (22), Yeliz (22), Yeşim (19), Melek (21), Hakan (20), Murat (21), Hilal (22), Semra
(20), Sevgi (24), Yıldız (24), Meltem (20) and Aslı (20). The common characteristics of the
participants are; they are between 18-24 years old, experienced being overweight and
are still trying to lose weight. Body mass index has not been taken into consideration
while determining the participant group but instead young people feeling overweight and
desiring to lose weight has been given importance. The participants have lost at least 5
at most 30 kilograms.
Data Analysis
In-depth interviews are decrypted first in the process of data analysis process. Then the
open, axial and selective coding have been applied to the decrypted interviews using
Nvivo 11, the data analysis program.
About the Socio-Cultural Construction of the Body
The body has been examined with various perspectives and methods depending on the
discipline ranging from health sciences to the social sciences. While the health sciences
describe the ill body, the social sciences describe the beautiful, attractive and desired
body. Since the body has been examined by different disciplines, there are various theo-
retical explanations about the body. Theoretical approaches explaining the body and the
weight loss behavior reside in the biological, psychological and sociological context. This
study provides explanations about the socio-cultural construction of the body. It can be
stated that this construction has been influenced heavily by the time we are living in. This
construction includes many areas such as the definition for ill and disabled body, people`s
clothing, make-up and hair-cut choices.
There have been cultural debates over the body concept throughout the history. These
debates have been shaped by the socio-cultural circumstances and the researchers of
the era (Nazlı 2005 and Illich 1986 cited in Howson, 2013, p. 8). Sontag (1978) and Turner
(1982) discuss that the body have been shaped by circumstances which look like individ-
ual choices at the first place but are indeed social factors (cited in. Turner, 2004, p. 216).
Social idols, gender expectations, role socialization, mass media tools are considered to
be important factors determining dissatisfaction about body among socio-cultural expla-
nations (Heinberg, 1996 cited in Barker and Galambos 2003, p. 142).
Among sociological explanations related to the social construction of the body, it is stated
that the body takes part at the center of the social and cultural meanings. Howson (2013),
Mary Douglas, Michel Foucault and Erwing Goffman (cited in Shilling, 2004), Feather-
stone (1991), Thomas and Ahmed (2004), Waskul and Vannini (2006 cited in Esgin 2011,
p. 670), Turner (cited in Wallece and Wolf, 2004, p. 436), Norbert Elias (cited in Howson,
2013, p. 9), Garrett (1997), S. Bordo’nun (Bordo 1993; Gimlin 2002 cited in Nazlı, 2005, p.
81) have explanations about the body being socially constructed.
