Live to Tell: Coming Out as Fat

Abstract

Fat individuals live in a fat phobic world. Individuals with a fat identity engage in identity management to negotiate the stigma surrounding fatness. Goffman proposed three forms of identity management: passing, covering, and withdrawing. More recently, scholars have proposed a fourth form of identity management: coming out. In this paper, I consider the usefulness of the four styles in managing the stigmatised identity of fatness. Special consideration is given to whether a fat identity may engage in passing. By integrating theory, literature, and my own experience, autoethnography allows me to identify important markers in my process of coming out as fat. I offer up my narrative as a contribution to the growing discourse on fat identity and stigma management. And in conclusion, I consider whether fat identity development, and coming out as fat, are developmental processes that can be characterised by stages.