Big Beautiful Woman

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Rubens' "Venus at the Mirror"
Rubens' "Venus at the Mirror"

"Big Beautiful Woman" (commonly abbreviated as BBW) is a neologism most frequently used in the context of affirmation of or sexual attraction to women who are overweight or obese, whose bodies have what may be considered excessive adipose tissue.

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[edit] Origin

The terms "Big Beautiful Women" and "BBW" were coined by Carole Shaw in 1979, when she launched BBW Magazine, a fashion and lifestyle magazine for plus-size women.[1]

[edit] Meaning

The term is a subjective, visually-determined concept that does not have an explicit lower or upper weight limitation, and may denote women who may be considered barely overweight to those who are morbidly obese.

The term has several near-synonyms with varying shades of meaning:

[edit] Usage

Although "BBW" may have been first used and copyrighted in the context of BBW Magazine, the term's usage spread over the years, to the point that even women who had never heard of the magazine began to refer to themselves as "BBWs."

Some women may adopt the term as a personal preference over the term Rubenesque, or full-figured, because they may not necessarily have large breasts or hips. Such terms, and others such as "queen-sized", "plus-sized", or "fat" may lead to feelings of marginalization or non-inclusion for some women. However, some strongly prefer the term fat over other words which they consider unnecessary euphemisms.

The term is also commonly used as a positive euphemism by people involved with the fat acceptance movement, who often reject the descriptor "obese".

Today, the abbreviation is often found in personal ads (and online dating services) denoting an identification with (or preference for) such women.

The term BBW is also used to denote events specifically targeted to such women, and persons interested in them, such as specific gathering nights in dance clubs, restaurants, fashion stores and shows, etc so that an environment of acceptance is achieved by having like-minded or like-bodied persons in attendance.

[edit] Websites

A large number of BBW websites are pornographic, or even sexually fetishistic in nature (including fat fetishism and feederism).

However, there are also BBW sites which are dedicated to sending out a size-positive message towards larger women, some of which denounce the dieting industry as encouraging women to lose weight to conform to what is considered the ideal by mainstream society.

[edit] Variants

The acronym BBBW refers to Big Beautiful Black Woman. Another variant is SSBBW; Super-Size Big Beautiful Woman, which refers to women who are above a US dress size 26.

While "Big Beautiful Woman" may be prevalent in the Americas and Europe, in Asian countries where obesity may be considered uncommon or deemed unhealthy, other terms are used. For example, in Japan the term "debu" (デブ) is used, but usually with a pejorative meaning.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ A Short History of BBW Magazine, <http://bbwmagazine.com/pastandpresent_3.htm>. Retrieved on 24 December 2007 

[edit] External links