Please join students and faculty for a presentation by Maria Mastronardi of the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. Her topic: "From Ophelia to Ana: Female Adolescence in the New World." The presentation traces public discourse about the Pro-Ana community, an Internet-based “pariah” network whose participants reject traditional, medicalized ideas about eating disorders. Using media texts, policy documents and discussions posted on Pro-Ana websites, she will analyze the “moral panic” surrounding this community and offer a more productive understanding of eating disorders. She argues that the Pro-Ana community is scapegoated because its very existence exposes manifold contradictions about food, dieting and the body that crowd everyday discourse of young femininity. Lunch will be served.

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