Canadian University Press Releases/Newswire

Source: University of Ottawa
http://www.media.uottawa.ca/mediaroom/news_details-e.php?nid=980

University of Ottawa takes on "Weighty Issues" during Frontiers in Research Lectures

November 8, 2006

OTTAWA, November 8, 2006 — Stone Age peoples carved obese female figurines. Ancient Greeks built strong and athletic looking statues.

Our modern media—including magazines, movies, music videos, television and video games—reflect a preoccupation with "thin" idealizations. History shows our obsession with body weight has clearly existed as long as we have been a self-aware species.

As obesity reaches epidemic proportions at the same time that the "cult of thin" is exacting tragic tolls in individual lives, the complexity of "weight" deserves attention.

WHAT: Weighty Issues: The 9th Annual uOttawa Frontiers in Research Lectures

WHERE: Tabaret Hall, Room 112 (550 Cumberland Street)

WHEN: November 15, 2006

1:40 p.m. Jeffrey Friedman, The Rockefeller University, United States Genes, Behaviour and Metabolism: Balancing the Energy Equation (English presentation)

2:20 p.m. Abdul Dulloo, University of Fribourg, Switzerland Weight fluctuations: Impact on metabolic susceptibility to obesity and metabolic syndrome (French presentation)

3:00 p.m. Helga Dittmar, University of Sussex, United Kingdom Does size matter? The impact of idealized media models on girls’, women’s and men’s body image (English presentation)

4:10 p.m. Le point sur l’obésité Découverte, Radio-Canada (French screening)

4:30 p.m. Thin HBO Documentary Film, Directed by Lauren Greenfield (English screening)

6:00 p.m. Joan Jacobs Brumberg, Cornell University, United States Fasting Girls: Then and Now