New research on Danish body activism

Lene Bull Christiansen, Associate Professor and member of the research group Intercultural Studies, has received a grant of 2,782,809 Danish Kroners from Independent Research Fund Denmark for a project with the title 'Feminist Activism in Transition' (FAT). The project explores Danish body activists who have begun appearing in the media over the last couple of years - they participate in talk shows on TV and are featured in newspapers and magazines. Here they are given space to engage in the struggle against ‘perfection culture’, against discrimination of fat people, and to give voice to experiences of living as a fat person in Denmark. Many of these activists started out posting pictures on the social medium Instagram, where a feminist subculture of fat activists has been established. On Instagram activists share images and experiences – and importantly – they support each other. 

This research project is interested in understanding how such a subculture has gained access to conventional media spaces. It will investigate how their -otherwise marginalized- messages have made their way to the mainstream. The project will look at two groups of people: The journalists that write about and include the body activists in their respective media; and the Instagrammers that form the subculture, which the body activists are part of. The project will investigate how this activist movement uses the new opportunities afforded by social media (in particular Instagram) in their attempt to propagate a new female body ideal and to organise feminist resistance to sexism and marginalisation – and ultimately – to understand how instagram activism can be a stepping stone to other media.