The Next Step: Book Writing

Since I wrote this first entry in this blog, I’ve learned more about the landscape of bariatric authorship and the theological and cultural issues surrounding weight loss. To say there’s a dearth of scholarship in this intersection is a bit of an understatement.

For nearly a decade now, I’ve aimed to write a book. Like many who have that goal, there are plenty of reasons to push it off: too busy, impostor syndrome, and a lack of a subject worth writing thousands of words on.

But here, finally, seems something worthwhile to write about. When I do a cursory look at WLS books, it’s rare to see anything that engages a theological or spiritual approach, and when it does, it seems deeply off the mark.

Take, for instance, one of the most successful Christian weight loss programs. Weigh Down Ministries argues that being fat is akin to slavery and bondage. The only true liberation, then, is through a better righteousness. Hannah Bacon, whose work I’ve come to appreciate as I’m researching deeply, saw something I did as well: “[Weigh Down] polarizes food and God… falling in love with God equated to falling out of love with God and that to eat ‘well’ — to become a ‘thin eater’ — meant to transcend any desire for food altogether” (Bacon, 2).

There has to be a better way.

And while, yes, there is a dearth of literature, what has been written is comprehensive and deeply helpful. Studies like Bacon’s and others help to develop a strong theological basis for the work, primarily through feminist and liberation lenses.

What is lacking is a good translator. How might someone who hasn’t read Foucault, Radford-Reuther, and others be able to think through their decisions? So that seems to be the task.

I want to showcase what brilliance some of these scholars have done. So, over the next few weeks, as I’m writing a manuscript, I want to use this blog to celebrate the people whose shoulders I’m standing on as I go. In part, it’s a behind-the-scenes approach to writing, but it’s also a chance for a deeper dive for any of you interested in existing meatier treatises.

There will also be places where I will disagree and have to find a new synthesis: standing on the shoulders of others doesn’t remove the responsibility to reach further. I invite you, too, to comment along the way.

I’m excited to finally feel like I have a space worth offering my voice, and I’m grateful for all the gifts of scholars that give this important discourse life.