Feminists have been examining beauty standards and the ways in which our bodies are policed for a long time now, but Emma Dabiri’s new book still feels fresh, new and important, proving that there is always more to say on the subject. In Disobedient Bodies, the Irish-Nigerian academic and author examines “the forces of social control that shape our relationship to beauty… throughout our lives” and offers ways to resist them.
Throughout Disobedient Bodies, as in her previous books, Dabiri displays her ability to convey complicated ideas in an accessible, elegant way (at one point, delightfully, she says it is important to use her own Hiberno-English vernacular in her writing – “disobedience occurs in a multitude of ways”), moving easily between the micro and macro. Throughout the book she writes powerfully about her own complicated relationship with beauty and her appearance, and skilfully traces the links between our modern conception of our bodies and a consumerist capitalist system that literally objectifies everything it touches.
When it comes to exploring the intersecting hierarchical systems of gender, capitalism, class and race that affect, and indeed distort, our relationships with our bodies, Dabiri’s analysis is always thoughtful and insightful. She is particularly good on the limitations of “inclusive” commercial presentations of beauty, which merely expand the range of commodified body types: “I’m excited by the politics of refusal. The refusal of all the choices on offer – not inclusion in the system, but the system’s transformation. The politics of disobedience.”
Disobedient Bodies is a polemic that also offers liberating solutions. Dabiri suggests that we look to a range of modes of viewing the world, including old Irish and Yoruba traditions, to find more helpful ways of understanding not just our bodies, but the process of ageing, and the very nature of beauty.
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There is a great generosity of spirit in her writing as she urges her readers to embrace a holistic approach to beauty, finding it not just in consumerism or even in physical appearance, but in nature and action.
“By becoming disobedient, my hope is that we can, against all the odds, take pleasure in the experience of our bodies,” Dabiri says. This call to joyful disobedience is further proof that Dabiri is one of our most important and exciting thinkers and writers.
