Katriona O'Sullivan on women's bodies, hunger & why women shrink

About this episode

Dr Katriona O’Sullivan discusses her experiences with body image, trauma, and the societal pressures on women.

My guest today is Dr Katriona O’Sullivan. Katriona grew up in Coventry and her early life was marked by poverty, addiction and abuse. She became pregnant and subsequently homeless at 15, let down and written off by the adults who were meant to care for her. In 1998 she moved to Dublin with her son and entered Trinity College through the access programme. There She earnt a Phd in psychology and is now a professor at Maynooth university, directs the National Centre for inclusive higher education and writes a regular column for the Irish Independent. Amongst other things. Katriona’s debut memoir, Poor, an intimate personal examination of the complexities of growing up in poverty, spent an incredible 114 weeks in the bestseller lists. Now she’s written Hungry, a fierce and moving examination of her own battle with body image and the way trauma, class and gender shape the way women see themselves. Katriona joined me to talk about spending a lifetime trying to shrink herself to fit and how the world benefits from women hating our bodies. We also discussed why over yogaing is a class issue, holding mothers to a different standard, ambition hunger, parenting boys, really bad sex, how…

People in this episode

Host: Sam Baker

Guest: Dr Katriona O’Sullivan

Topics covered

• women's bodies
• body image
• poverty
• trauma
• gender
• parenting
• class issues

Keywords

• body image
• women
• poverty
• trauma
• gender
• ambition hunger
• parenting boys

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Trinity College, Maynooth university, Irish Independent

Books & works: Poor, Hungry

Places: Coventry, Dublin

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