Redefining the Body

Abstract

the same size. And gyms, forget it, people work hard in New York, and in factories or in offices, not on cell phones. When they get off work, they relax with a cigarette and a cup of coffee, not on some treadmill.... Well, I was wrong ... I began noticing that all of my old friends from growing up here looked like they stopped eating. One after the other, we'd get together and I'd look at them, and the only way I'd remember them is if I imagined a little more fat on their face. -Danielle Abrams, unpublished script for her performance Butch in the Kitchen, 2000. s Butch in the Kitchen discovered, even the unhealthy denizens of New York City have succumbed to the ubiquitous gym culture that has swept America in the past twenty years. Everyone, from the rural farmer in Kentucky to the ivory tower academic in New York City, goes to the gym in order to work out. Even overweight, masculine, working-class lesbians such as Butch feels compelled to join a gym, work out, get in shape, lose weight, and build muscle. Today, it is not enough to simply be thin. One must be thin and healthy, with low cholesterol, clean lungs, caffeine-free brains, and the correct ratio of body fat to muscle. Functional activities, such as