Honor National Eating Disorders Awareness Week with Project BodyTalk

The last week of February is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week, a week-long way to raise awareness of eating disorders, the devastation they cause, and hope for the future.

This year's theme is "It's Time to Talk About It," a notion I love because I'm all about talking about it, whatever "it" may be. Secrecy perpetuates bad feelings--let's get all the "its" out in the open. So I'm excited to be partnering with the National Eating Disorders Association to use that week to raise awareness and get people thinking in new ways--not just about eating disorders but about all of the crazy, disordered attitudes toward food and our bodies we hold in this country. This year I'm doing my part through Project BodyTalk, a web-based audio project I started two years ago to give people a place to talk about their relationships with food, eating, and their bodies.


If you're anywhere near the Syracuse, New York, area the last week of February, you can come to one of our open recording sessions. We'll put you in a private studio and let you record a commentary. You can choose to be anonymous, use a first name, or use your whole name. You can talk about something you love about your body, something you've struggled with, something you want other people to know about eating disorders--it's up to you. I'll be posting details on the sessions soon, but I expect they'll be held on campus at the Newhouse School, 3-8 p.m. every day that week. (Contact me for more info as the time gets closer.)

If, like most people, you don't live anywhere near Syracuse, or you can't make it to one of our sessions, you can still do your part by recording a commentary and sending it my way. Listen to some of the incredibly powerful and moving commentaries on the site for inspiration, and then make your own MP3 or MP4 file, or use a CD, and send it in through this handy web submission form. You can also hear an NPR program on Project BodyTalk here.

I hope you'll join me and Project BodyTalk this week for National Eating Disorders Awareness Week. Because you know what? It's really freaking time to talk about it.

Project BodyTalk on 51% this Thursday

I'm delighted that the talented Susan Barnett, host of the nationally syndicated NPR show 51%, will be airing a segment this Thursday, January 6, on Project BodyTalk. This audio and web-based project collects commentaries (a la StoryCorps) on issues relating to food, eating, and bodies. This show includes a lively conversation between Barnett and myself, as well as clips from several audio commentaries made last year by faculty and students at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. You can hear the full commentaries on the Project BodyTalk website.

Here's a list of NPR stations that carry the show. I hope you'll tune in, and then visit the website to listen to more commentaries and upload your own.

Thanks to my amazing grad student from last year, Megan Swann, who took the photo above and created the website.

BODYTALK: The video

Sara Sultanik, a talented grad student here at Newhouse, put together this cool video about the BODYTALK project. Thanks, Sara!

Everyone else--what are you waiting for? I'd love to get an MP3 from you for the BODYTALK project.

The BODYTALK project

If you live in central New York, please come participate in the BODYTALK project at Syracuse University. It's modeled after NPR's Storycorps booth, a traveling audio booth where people could record anonymous commentaries about things that mattered to them.

BODYTALK gives people a chance to record commentaries about their relationships with their bodies, appearances, food, eating, and weight. For the first two weeks of November, a recording studio at SU's Newhouse School of Public Communications (where I teach) will be set aside for anyone who wants to record a commentary. You can give your name or do it anonymously. Some commentaries will air on NPR's national show 51%; others will, I hope, be published eventually on a website.

If you can't get to Syracuse, you can record your own commentary and send me the mp3 file. I'd love to have as many people as possible take part in the project.

Who: Anyone!
What: Record a commentary (between 3 and 10 minutes long) in
Newhouse 2, Room 472, Suite P
When: Nov. 2-13; most days 3-8 p.m. (sign up at suite P, or walk
in at any time)

Because the more we talk about these feelings, the more shame and stigma will fall away.


*Photo originally published by Roosevelt University.

Cupcakes and conversation

If you're anywhere near Syracuse, NY, this Thursday, please stop over at the panel discussion and book signing for Feed Me!. The book includes fabulous essays from some of my favorite writers, including Joyce Maynard (whose poignant memoir about making pie with, and then for, her mother still makes me tear up), Caroline Leavitt (who wrote a haunting piece about men, power, grief, and food), Diana Abu-Jaber (writing about the culture clash between Bedouin and American eating habits), and many others.

We'll hold a panel discussion with Mary Tantillo of the University of Rochester's Eating Disorders Program and Cris Haltom of Ithaca, both of whom speak eloquently about food, eating, and related issues. And yes, there will be cupcakes. I'm not saying they'll live up to the perky frosting on this one, but, you know, a cupcake's as good a reason as any to come out on a chilly night.

If you don't show up, I'll have to eat all the cupcakes myself.