Banca de DEFESA: KENYA LIMA DE ARAUJO

Obesity and meanings attributed by health professionals affected by this phenomenon

obesity phenomenology, health professionals, obesity stigma.

This is a study on the meanings of obesity attributed by obese and non-obese health professionals, workers of a public health institution in the city of Salvador, Bahia. This research in the field of phenomenology analyzes narratives from a hermeneutic perspective by allowing a comprehensive look at the obese condition. The meanings attributed by health professionals to their obesity transpose technical-scientific parameters, and in their subjectivities share meanings tangent to psychosocial and cultural aspects that are interpreted as constituent and structuring of their experiences. Obesity reveals itself as stigma, iatrogeny, conflict, guilt and suffering in the biographical fragments of the collaborating subjects of this study. Health professionals tell how they think and feel their obesity in the personal and socio-professional spheres, and pave the way for endless readings of hermeneutics about obesity and endless possibilities of understanding about being obese in the world of life.