Breasts: Our Most Public Private Parts - Softcover

Spadola, Meema

3.55

31 ratings by Goodreads

9781885171276: Breasts: Our Most Public Private Parts

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1885171277 ISBN 13: 9781885171276

Publisher: Wildcat Canyon Pr, 1998

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Presents interviews with women and the impact their breasts have on their lives and how they really feel about their breasts

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Review:

"I believe that every woman has a breast story," says Meema Spadola, who has spun that assertion into a much-praised documentary on the subject and, subsequently, a book called Breasts. Between its colorful covers is an epic saga of pleasure, power, affection, woe, consternation, fear, anticipation, and ready-or-not metamorphosis shared by females age 2 to 90. Because breasts are a hard-to-conceal badge of womanhood, 9-year-old Ali finds that her new curves "shoved her out of the world of childhood and into puberty." How those around a girl treat this change makes a huge difference to self-esteem. "Tie those things down, you might poke somebody's eye out," a mother kids her 13-year-old daughter. Others recall being teased much less kindly within their families for developing too fast or not fast enough, and dodging catcalls and far worse from strangers who suddenly felt free to comment on their bodies.

Leaping beyond the angst of puberty and adolescence, Spadola thoughtfully probes into how women feel about their breasts--whether natural, enhanced, or downsized by surgery--in relation to work, love, baby nurturing, aging, cancer, sex, and friendship. "Breasts are aggressive," says one woman. "Men feel compelled to look at them, so sometimes I feel like it's rude to other women to show too much breast." Whether indulgent or insightful, Breasts delivers on its promise to reveal what women really feel and how their self-images help shape the course of their lives. --Francesca Coltrera

From the Publisher:

(Revealing) Book Explores How Women's Breasts Shape Their Lives: Breasts are simultaneously romanticized and taboo, worshiped and exploited, but despite the notoriety of women's most prominent feature, how often do we hear what females really think about their breasts? Why is the size and shape of a woman's breasts so important? Breasts: Our Most Public Private Parts is a study by author Meema Spadola that investigates how breasts shape women's lives. Whether their breasts are huge or tiny, saggy or perky, women tell stories and poignantly reveal personal feelings about their own breasts in this groundbreaking publication.

"No one can deny that our breasts play a crucial role in our experiences of puberty, motherhood, sex, health, and aging," says Spadola. "So it's logical that how we feel about our breasts can profoundly impact our lives." A variety of women confirm this view, including the vice president of the "Itty Bitty Titty committee," a stripper with implants, and a twenty-four year old who had a breast reduction. Each share funny, sad, and always insightful stories such as a thirteen-year old talking about her developing breasts, and an eighty-seven year old woman describing her experience of losing both her breasts to cancer. Along with exploring the private and personal feelings of women in these stories, Spadola interviewed professionals including Dr. Susan Love, author of Dr. Susan Love's Breast book, Dr. June Reinsich, co-author of The Kinsey Institute New Report on Sex, and Dr. Loren Eskenazi, a plastic surgeon specializing in breasts, as well as lactation consultants and lingerie sales women.

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