Lewis & Clark Grad School plans ‘Fat Studies & Health at Every Size’ weekend course
In the course, students ‘will examine fat bias, fat shame and weight-based oppression as a social justice issue that intersects with other systems of oppression.’
Other similar courses at the school are ‘Eating Disorders in Transgender and Gender Expansive Populations’ and ‘Body Politics.’
Lewis & Clark Graduate School in Portland, Oregon, is offering an online weekend course called “Fat Studies & Health at Every Size.”
The course will run from Feb. 28 to March 2, from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
“Fat Studies & Health at Every Size” aims to counter mainstream conceptions of weight and fatness.
“This course explores the interdisciplinary field of scholarship in Fat Studies that aims to debunk weight-centric misconceptions and countering mainstream narratives,” the course description states. “Participants will examine fat bias, fat shame and weight-based oppression as a social justice issue that intersects with other systems of oppression.”
Sarah Alexander, an instructor at Lewis & Clark, is teaching the course. Alexander majored in Psychology and Women’s Studies while at the University of Virginia, and currently works as a therapist.
A university spokesman explained the rationale behind the course, telling Campus Reform: “This course is focused on professional training for both current mental health practitioners seeking continuing education and counseling graduate students preparing for careers as mental health practitioners.”
“The goal of the course is to help these mental health practitioners serve all clients effectively, regardless of any client’s weight,” she continued. “The ability to serve a full range of clients well is important for mental health professionals, given the range of patients’ body types, particularly patients seeking help for eating disorders or other body/weight-related concerns.”
The course counts toward the graduate school’s “Eating Disorders Treatment Certificate,” an “inclusive, weight-neutral, Health At Every Size approach that challenges harmful systemic biases directed at larger bodies.”
Another course that is part of the certificate program is titled “Eating Disorders in Transgender and Gender Expansive Populations,” in which students learn how to react to the supposed issue that “eating disorder treatments were [traditionally] modeled after white, cisgender, neurotypical populations, specifically girls/women that often do not reflect the experience of BIPOC and/or TGD, neurodivergent populations.”
Another course, “Body Politics,” will have students “consider liberation-based counseling practices to counter the objectification, commodification, power and gendering of bodies in late capitalist societies.”
Courses covering “Fat Studies” and “body positivity” seem to be proliferating among many other colleges and universities that are teaching students to see obesity in a positive light. Universities offering such courses include Harvard, the University of Maryland, and the New School in New York.
Campus Reform contacted Lewis & Clark Graduate School for comment. This story will be updated accordingly.
