Learning about bodies and the lived consequences

From the perspective of a final year physical education and sport and exercise science undergraduate student, this paper explores the relationship between learned and lived experiences related to the body. The research uses an autoethnographic approach that focuses on the educational and social issues that the first author faced as his physical identity changed. The author reflects on the ways in which his once acceptable body experienced declining capital (Bourdieu 1984) as his body became too ‘fat’ within the spaces that he was connected to. In an attempt to resist institutionalised understandings that imply that larger bodies are a result of neglect and poor lifestyle choices, this research demonstrates the impact of cultural understandings on the everyday life of a university student seeking an ‘acceptable body’.