Da pressão estética à gordofobia: violências nos memes em tempos de pandemia de Covid-19

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic impacts the world, transforms routines and exposes how we relate to our bodies. The spread of memes with themes concerning the fear of increasing body weight in the pandemic period, unveils the social construction of power based on the body. This study aims to understand how the construction of beauty standards and fatphobia are engendered in the representation of the female body in memes, disseminated in Brazil during the pandemic of COVID-19 in 2020. The theory turns to the pandemic from a gender perspective, to the emergence and development of memes as a Brazilian-cultural element, to the subjectivity and the female body, besides the construction of beauty and hostility based on the size of the bodies. The investigation was based on Discourse Analysis applied to a corpus composed of memes, collected on Instagram and Google. The results show discourses that perpetuate structural violence and gender violence through the construction of female body image. The material reveals that social constructions under the body and beauty have been present among girls since their childhood, which makes them rivals in adulthood. The speeches operate classification and hostility towards women based on their bodies. Finally, the narratives reveal the slim female body as a symbol of beauty and success, while the fat female body is associated with ugliness and other negative aspects.