The Corporeality of Living Stressful Femininity

Abstract

This article analyzes young Swedish women’s experiences of living stressful femininity from an existentialist gender theoretical perspective. The study is based on qualitative interviews with 25 women, aged 17–25, who had registered for a stress management course at a youth health centre. Our analysis suggests that their experiences of stress can be related to the renegotiation of gender constructions that have occurred within the Swedish society. The young female subject can be viewed as living through a historic break between a historical position as a subordinated ‘Other’ while simultaneously having to navigate within contemporary discourses of successful femininity. The doing of normative femininity resulted in an exhausting and draining self-evaluating circle. The experiences of having a painful and collapsing body led to a sense of loss of access to and confidence in their bodies. This should be understood as a loss both of subjectivity and connectedness with the corporeality of existence.