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School of Public Health
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Is Focusing on Weight Hazardous to the Public’s Health?

Every day, we are bombarded with dire warnings about America’s “obesity epidemic.” Yet studies show that a moderately active larger person is likely to be far healthier (and to live longer) than someone who is thin but sedentary. After years spent scrutinizing medical studies and interviewing leading doctors, scientists, eating- disorder specialists, and psychiatrists, Professor Paul Campos leads the backlash against “weight hysteria.”

In memory of Dr. William J. Bicknell, Founder and Chair Emeritus of the Department of International Health.

Questions: kara@bu.edu

2013 William J. Bicknell Lecturer

Paul Campos

Professor of Law, University of Colorado Law School, and author of The Obesity Myth

Paul Campos left a position with a Chicago law firm to begin his teaching career at Colorado Law School in 1990. As a scholar, he has focused on constitutional law and legal theory. His graduate studies in English literature, which culminated in a thesis on Shakespeare’s King Lear, provided him with rigorous training in literary theory that has been helpful in his current work in constitutional interpretation. He has written several well-regarded law review articles in this area, including “Against Constitutional Theory,” published in the Yale Journal of Law and Humanities, and “Advocacy in Scholarship,” published in the California Law Review. Both of these articles have been noted as major critiques of the political and normative orientation of current constitutional theory. Professor Campos’ regular column for the Rocky Mountain News (distributed by the Scripps Howard News Service), written for a general audience on political, social, and legal issues, has developed a considerable following. A packed house, drawn by his provocative take on a wide range of topics, attended his presentation of the 27th Annual Austin W. Scott, Jr. Lecture entitled “The Obesity Myth & The Lewinsky Scandal,” which was based on his latest book project. His second book, Jurismania: The Madness of American Law, critiques the American legal system. Professor Campos also served as the first director of CU law school’s Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law.

Panelists:

Frank Hu

Professor of Nutrition and Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health

Abigail Saguy

Associate Professor/Vice Chair of Sociology and Associate Professor of Gender Studies, UCLA, and author of What’s Wrong with Fat?