Bodily Practices and Healthy Bodies: Representations of Gymnastics in a Brazilian Women’s Magazine (1940–1950)

Abstract

This research aims to understand the influence of bodily practices, especially gymnastics, in the construction of representations of a healthy body conveyed in a Brazilian women’s magazine in the 1940s and 1950s. We use records from the Jornal das Moças magazine for the analysis based on the theoretical and methodological assumptions of cultural history. The results show that gymnastics for women was linked to body maintenance and used as a tool for establishing a body standard, thus disciplining and shapingthe construction of women’s health concepts, determined by the aesthetic bias of that period: a slim body as an ideal standard of beauty and health.