Having studied Saguy and Conrad and Meghann Lucy’s lecture, we see how body weight
has been medicalized, with major social and psychological consequences for people.
Your task is to consider: how have you been medicalized?
This paper gives you the opportunity to use the tools of medicalization to consider how
you have been medicalized. If medical professions and industries have gained more
prominence in shaping how we experience our bodies and lives, consider your own life:
choose one important aspect of your life that has come under the jurisdiction of the
medical industry. Research the history and changing status of this “condition”—be it
body size or appearance, mental or emotional health, a physical state or any other
behavior, affliction, addiction, or something else. Explain how and why this condition
has over time transformed into a medical one. If you don’t feel like sharing, that’s fine,
focus your research on a condition affecting someone you know (and use an alias).
