dr. jill andrew phd

Jill Andrew

Toronto–st. paul's, get involved, here for toronto–st. paul's.

Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD is the MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's. She is also the Official Opposition Critic for Women's Social and Economic Opportunity, and for Culture, Heritage. Jill is a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, a first of its kind in Ontario legislative history. She was the first Black & Queer person to be elected to the Ontario Legislature. 

Jill has been a leading voice on issues of gender, race and social justice, the housing crisis, healthcare inequities, education, long-term care and the immeasurable benefit of arts and culture. She has supported numerous people dealing with all sorts of issues, from evictions and bad faith landlords to insufficient government support to people with disabilities.

Jill co-founded Body Confidence Canada in support of body diversity. She received a Lifetime Advocacy Award from the Black Coalition for AIDS Prevention, the 2022 Viola Desmond Alumni Award, and the Nancy Ruth Award for her commitment to gender equity. She was also named one of Post City Magazine Toronto’s 21 Most Inspirational Women of 2021.

Outside of politics, Jill is an award-winning educator, an equity and body-image advocate and writer. She lives in Toronto - St. Paul's with her partner and their two cats, Dorothy Dandridge and Josephine Baker.

Join the movement

Give what you can, sudbury mpp west demands anti-scab legislation as snolab strike escalates.

QUEEN’S PARK — Following the passage of anti-scab legislation at the federal level with unanimous support, MPP Jamie West (Sudbury) called on the Conservative Government to enact Bill 90, the Anti-Scab Labour Act.

“The SNOLAB Workers love their jobs but can’t afford to make ends meet. These Workers need...

NDP announces Homelessness Task Force

QUEEN’S PARK – Official Opposition NDP Affordability critic Bhutila Karpoche (Parkdale – High Park) joined advocates and community members to announce the Homelessness Task Force Act, 2024.

“No one chooses to spend the night on the street,” said Karpoche. “But more and more people are slipping...

Evicted and Abandoned:103-Year-Old Among 200 Evicted by Chartwell

QUEEN'S PARK — MPP Lise Vaugeois (Thunder Bay—Superior North), Critic for Seniors, and MPP Chris Glover (Spadina-Fort York) released the following statement after meeting with family members and residents of Heritage Glen Retirement Home in Mississauga to address the recent eviction notices issued by...

NDP MPP Teresa Armstrong brings forward legislation for childcare worker task force

QUEEN’S PARK – MPP Teresa Armstrong (London Fanshawe) will debate legislation to create a task force dedicated to supporting childcare workers and addressing the recruitment and retention crisis.

“When early childcare workers are supported, parents and their children who rely on them are supported as...

Niagara MPP Gates calls for support to Chippawa library facing closure

QUEEN’S PARK - NDP MPP Wayne Gates (Niagara Falls) issued the following statement today regarding the recent closure of the library branch in Chippawa:

“The closure of the Chippawa library branch is a significant loss for our community.

NDP welcomes IPC special report on the Greenbelt

QUEEN’S PARK - Marit Stiles, Leader of the Official Opposition NDP, released the following statement after the Information and Privacy Commissioner (IPC) confirmed she will be publishing a special report into the Ford government's handling of documents and records related to the Greenbelt.

“The NDP...

NDP calls out province’s harmful child care funding delays for leaving parents and providers in the lurch

TORONTO – Official Opposition NDP MPP Bhutila Karpoche (Parkdale – High Park) joined parents, providers and advocates outside Sunnyside Garden Daycare, calling on the province to immediately release the child care funding formula and provide emergency funding for this local daycare at risk of closure.

Premier’s silence on Grassy Narrows study appalling: NDP

TORONTO — Ontario NDP leader Marit Stiles issued the following statement on Doug Ford’s silence in response to a new study showing mercury poisoning near Grassy Narrows First Nation has been worsened by ongoing industrial pollution:

“Doug Ford’s silence in the face of the news that the poisoning of the...

MPPs Mamakwa and Shaw ask for urgency to halt exacerbating Grassy Narrows mercury poisoning

QUEEN’S PARK –– A reveals that effluent from the Dryden mill is worsening mercury poisoning in Grassy Narrows. Despite no new mercury being released, bacteria in the effluent is generating dangerous methylmercury, doubling the mercury levels in fish.

Sol Mamakwa (Kiiwetinoong), Official Opposition NDP...

The heat is on: NDP and OFL call to protect workers from heat stress as temperatures climb

QUEEN’S PARK – Official Opposition NDP Critic for Climate Action Peter Tabuns (Toronto – Danforth) joined members of the Ontario Federation of Labour to launch a campaign to combat climate-driven heat stress in workplaces.

“Working in extreme heat conditions...

MPP West Takes Aim at Predatory Sudbury Landlords

QUEEN'S PARK — Today, NDP MPP Jamie West (Sudbury) called for enhanced tenant protections after tenants in a Sudbury building were targeted by an out-of-town landlord looking to evict them:

"Countless Sudbury tenants have contacted my office, reporting instances of their landlord attempting to coerce them...

NDP calls to mandate anti-dooring devices on all rideshare vehicles

QUEEN’S PARK – Official Opposition NDP MPP Chris Glover (Spadina – Fort York) joined advocates and community members to call for mandatory anti-dooring devices on all rideshare vehicles to prevent dangerous dooring accidents.

Glover shared his own experience after being doored and announced a motion that...

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Dr. Jill Andrew

Executive guest.

Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD is the MPP for Toronto-St.Paul’s. Jill serves as the the Ontario NDP Culture Critic and Women’s Issues Critic for the Official Opposition. Jill is also a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, a first of it’s kind in Ontario legislative history. Jill also sits on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.

Jill is the first Black and Queer person to be elected to the Ontario Legislature and reportedly in Canada. Jill was named Best MPP – First Runner Up by NOW Magazine Reader’s Choice Awards – an exciting acknowledgement for a rookie MPP.  Outside of politics, Jill is also co-founder of Body Confidence Canada and is an award-winning educator and former columnist, equity and body-image advocate, speaker and writer.

As the co-founder of #SizeismSUCKS and Body Confidence Awareness Week, Jill advocates to end size, weight and appearance-based discrimination, harassment and bullying. Her first Private Member’s Bill, Bill 61,  created an Eating Disorders Awareness Week the first week of February across Ontario. Bill 61 passed and became law in December 2020 Jill holds a Child & Youth Worker diploma from Humber College, a Bachelor of Education (BEd) from York University among her other undergraduate degrees, a Master’s degree in women and gender studies from the University of Toronto New College and her PhD from York University’s Faculty of Education. She was also a proud member of CUPE 3903 and OSSTF District 12. Jill’s PhD dissertation explored the trifecta of racism, sexism and fat hatred experienced by Black women in the GTA, their strategies of both accommodation and resistance as well as everyday, systemic and policy reform necessary to facilitate change against anti-Black racism, gendered violence and weight discrimination.

She is a community co-owner of Glad Day Bookshop – the world’s oldest LGBT bookstore and has been an avid volunteer and donor supporting organizations across the GTA that prioritize Black and racialized communities, youth, women, the arts, LGBTQ2+ communities and chronic health advocacy among others.

Jill is also a graduate of the Women Win TO political training series. She is passionate about documenting, celebrating and advocating for people’s human rights and their right to social, cultural and economic access.

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February 15th, 2021

Dr. Jill Andrew chosen to be the NDP candidate in Toronto-St. Paul’s

TORONTO — New Democrats in Toronto-St. Paul’s have selected incumbent MPP Jill Andrew to be their NDP candidate in the 2022 provincial election. A certified child and youth worker, teacher and equity advocate, Andrew, who also holds a Masters in Women & Gender Studies and a PhD in Education, co-founded Body Confidence Canada and is a community co-owner of the world’s oldest LGBT bookstore, Glad Day Bookshop. In 2018, Andrew became the first queer Black MPP elected to Ontario’s legislature and in any legislature across Canada. Andrew currently serves as Official Opposition critic for Culture, Heritage and for Women’s Issues, and is a founding member of the NDP Black Caucus — a first of its kind in Ontario's legislative history.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath “Whether it’s fighting for help for struggling small businesses in Little Jamaica, advocating for tenants' rights, or sounding the alarm about lack of PPE at a local long-term care home, Jill has a commanding presence in the legislature and works incredibly hard for the people of Toronto-St. Paul’s. The NDP has an ambitious plan to help people when we form government in 2022, and I know Jill will help us get it done: world-class public health care, better quality of life for seniors as they age, homes people can afford, affordable child care, and a thriving public education system.”

Jill Andrew, NDP candidate for Toronto-St. Paul’s “I am deeply grateful to have local New Democrats in my corner, supporting my run for re-election in Toronto-St. Paul’s. Our community needs hope right now, and we the NDP will keep pushing for the help they need to get through the pandemic. We need more staff in long-term care; smaller, safer class sizes; paid sick days; direct financial support for small businesses; an arts sector strategy and rent subsidies for tenants. BIPOC, women, seniors, community members with disabilities and essential workers hit the hardest during COVID-19 will not be left behind. In 2022, with Andrea Horwath leading the way, an NDP government will make its positive proposals a reality by investing in all the things Ford has been cutting and squeezing — long-term care, education, public health, housing and so much more.”

• Andrew is fighting for a “Save Little Jamaica” strategy to help local and neighbouring businesses along Eglinton hurt by COVID-19 and the Eglinton Crosstown LRT construction, and is also advocating for an intersectional gender equity strategy to support women and other marginalized communities
• Andrew has led the charge to reverse Ford’s cuts to culture and to support for survivors of gender-based violence
• Andrew's Bill 61 to proclaim the first week of February Eating Disorders Awareness Week passed unanimously and became law in December 2020, and she has co-sponsored a bill calling for a universal protocol to ensure a high standard of care for Ontarians living with sickle cell disease
• Andrew lives in Toronto-St.Paul's with her family and furry felines Josephine Baker and Dorothy Dandridge

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Jill Andrew

Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD is the MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's. Jill serves as the the Ontario NDP Culture Critic and Women's Issues Critic for the Official Opposition. Jill is also a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, a first of it's kind in Ontario legislative history and she also sits on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.

Crip Times Podcast

July 26, 2022

Crip Times: The Jill Andrew Episode

Jill Andrew

Toronto–st. paul's, standing up for toronto–st. paul's.

Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD is the MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's. She is also the Official Opposition Critic for Women's Social and Economic Opportunity, and for Culture, Heritage. Jill is a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, a first of its kind in Ontario legislative history. She was the first Black & Queer person to be elected to the Ontario Legislature. 

Jill has been a leading voice on issues of gender, race and social justice, the housing crisis, healthcare inequities, education, long-term care and the immeasurable benefit of arts and culture. She has supported numerous people dealing with all sorts of issues, from evictions and bad faith landlords to insufficient government support to people with disabilities.

Jill co-founded Body Confidence Canada in support of body diversity. She received a Lifetime Advocacy Award from the Black Coalition for AIDS Prevention, the 2022 Viola Desmond Alumni Award, and the Nancy Ruth Award for her commitment to gender equity. She was also named one of Post City Magazine Toronto’s 21 Most Inspirational Women of 2021.

Outside of politics, Jill is an award-winning educator, an equity and body-image advocate and writer. She lives in Toronto - St. Paul's with her partner and their two cats, Dorothy Dandridge and Josephine Baker.

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Aisha Fairclough

Director of operations and programming.

Fairclough is a television producer, body image advocate and diversity consultant. She is the founder of Representation Matters, a company dedicated to producing, creating, consulting, and casting for a more diverse lens in film and television.  Aisha has produced content for OWN Canada, HGTV, Food Network, Slice, Showtime,TVO, DIY Network and more. ​She is an alumni of Reelworld Film Festivals Emerging 20 program.Aisha also a plus fashion stylist & digital content creator who has worked with brands including Old Navy and Toni Plus. Her blog Fat in the City has been featured in the Toronto Star, Metro, etalk, Refinery 29, Huffington Post and Essence. She was the lead stylist on the primetime educational series Sex With Sunny Megatron. ​Aisha currently sits on the board of ​Inside Out LGBTQ+ Film Festival ​and is Strategic Planning Committee Chair.She is also on the council for the Ryerson University School of Fashion.  Aisha is a community co-owner of Glad Day   Bookshop - the world's oldest LGBT       bookstore. 

Jill Andrew

Andrew is an award-winning writer, a speaker, activist, equity educator and scholar. Her appearances include CTV, Global, CP24, MTV, CBC, BBC, THIS Magazine ("This Abject Body"), Metro News ("Ask Jill" life, career and education column), Toronto Star, tonight newspaper ("Jills Last Word") and NOW Magazine (Fashion). Andrew's community distinctions include: Premier of Ontario and JS Woodsworth Woman of Distinction nominations and being named one of University of Toronto Scarborough's "150 Neighbours" in recognition of outstanding contributions to the Scarborough community; two Canadian Ethnic Media Association awards, the Michele Landsberg Media Award among others. Her academic acknowledgements include CERLAC, Soroptimist Foundation of Canada, Patrick Solomon Urban Diversity awards, and being named Humber College’s School of Social & Community Services Alumna of Distinction. Andrew's doctoral research and focus include women & girls body image, leadership, race & representation politics, appearance-based discrimination, body-based harassment, and fashion. Andrew is a community co-owner of Glad Day Bookshop - the world's oldest LGBT bookstore. She is an avid cat lover, volunteer and donor within her communities.

Demeter Press will be closed from May 15th to June 3rd. All book orders will be shipped after June 3rd.

Body stories: in and out and with and through fat.

Price: $ 34.95

Page Count: 240

Publication Date: December 2020

ISBN: 978-1-77258-254-3

• Endorsements
• Table of Contents
• Author Biography

Body Stories is a thoughtful anthology of stories, theoretically-grounded reflections, and pedagogical explorations of fatness. This book is a useful complement for women’s/gender studies, body studies, queer studies and fat studies courses.

- Patricia Thille, PhD, University of Manitoba

Body Stories makes an important new contribution to discussions about body acceptance, fat experience and speaking up, and back, to body oppressions. The book uniquely combines scholarly, personal, and creative narratives but at its centre are stories, leading the reader through a series of insights into the heart of struggles to carve out peaceful fat embodiment and demands for fat justice.

- Dr George Parker, Lecturer, School of Midwifery, Otago Polytechnic

Body Stories is a healthy contribution to the field of Fat Studies. This intersectional investigation of fat as an identity, embodiment and experience is a very important one using personal accounts and creative content to give gravity and provide grounding to stories of embodiment and fatness.

- Allyson Mitchell, artist, academic and founder of Pretty, Porky and Pissed Off

An Interdisciplinary Journal of Body Weight and Society

Click here to read a review by Elyse Neumann

Introduction

Jill Andrew

Chapter 1: Because I’m fat, I don’t deserve satisfaction?: A young fat woman’s experience of sex

Samantha Keene

Chapter 2: “Neither Sari, Nor Sorry”: Open Letter to the Indian Yummy Mummy

Sucharita Sarkar

Creative submission: Beautiful/Ugly

Lori Don Levan

Chapter 3: I’m Not Fat, I’m Pregnant: A Critical Discussion of Current Debates in Body Size, Fatness, Pregnancy and Motherhood

Alys Einion

Chapter 4: Eating while fat: Mapping the Journey

Crystal Kotow and Sam Abel

Creative submission: (not) Too Fat to Tango

Chapter 5: “Who's Afraid of the Big Fat Feminist?”: An Auto-ethnography Study of Fatness in Academic Feminist Spaces

Melanie Stone and Allison Taylor

Chapter 6: The Rock Goddess in Large

Beatrice Hogg

Chapter 7: The Unpopularity of Being Fat and Black in Popular Culture: A Case Study on Gabourey Sidibe

Simone Samuels

Creative submission: She Says

Chapter 8: The Elephant in the (Class)room

Christin L. Seher

Chapter 9: “Your Wheelchair is so slim”: A Meditation on the Social Enactment of Beauty and Disability

Samantha Walsh

Chapter 10: My Body is My Business

Liis Windischmann

Chapter 11: On learning self-love: how one curvy disabled brown femme navigates the body as a site of daily struggle of living with/in pain

Creative submission: the line

Tracy Royce

Chapter 12: Just what the doctor ordered? Interrogating the narrative of ‘curing’ the fat body

Kelsey Ioannoni

Chapter 13: Body Lessons

Chapter 14: “Here Comes Fat May”: Learning and Relearning to Love My Body

Chapter 15: My new skin – tattoos and skin-deep body-love

Dorothée Jankuhn

Creative submission: A call for self-love

Tierra Hohn

Chapter 16: Self-Acceptance: An Unfinished, Intergenerational Story

Judy Verseghy

Chapter 17: Braced

Chapter 18: Lessons learned from Fat Women on TV

Idil Abdillahi and May Friedman

Creative submission: Embodied: the Female Body as a Repository of Experience

Leesa Streifler

Chapter 19: Substitute for love: My fat body and public health campaigns in New Zealand

Chapter 20: "Men are not dogs, they don't throw themselves on the bones": Fat as desirable

Victoria Team

Chapter 21: Being Gentle with Myself: A Lifelong Work in Progress

Steph Agosta

Creative submissions: The Flaps & Weight in Gold

Aries Hines

Chapter 22: Interpretation

Jessica Jagdeo

Chapter 23: We are the seeds: Conversations on beauty, body image and identity with Urban Indigenous women in Toronto

Emily Claire Blackmoon

Chapter 24: Bowel blues, bowel blows

May Friedman

Contributor Biographies

Jill’s Bio: Dr. Jill Andrew’s PhD “Put Together”: Black Women’s Body Stories in Toronto: (AD)Dressing Identity and the Threads that Bind explores the ‘trifecta’ of racism, sexism, fat hatred and their accommodation/resistance through fashion, activism, self-valuation & social interactions. Jill co-founded Body Confidence Canada, #SizeismSUCKS and is a politician NDP MPP Toronto-St.Paul’s.

May’s Bio: May Friedman’s research looks at unstable identities, including bodies that do not conform to traditional racial and national or aesthetic lines. Most recently much of May’s research has focused on intersectional approaches to fat studies considering the multiple and fluid experiences of both fat oppression and fat activism. May works at Ryerson University as a faculty member in the School of Social Work and in the Ryerson/York graduate program in Communication and Culture.

Contact Info

Inquiries: [email protected]

T: 289-383-0134

PO BOX 197, Coe Hill, ON, KOL - 1P0

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The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Government of Canada

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Conversations Over Coffee: Dr. Jill Andrew, MPP

What's going on in the st. paul's neighbourhood.

Reb Steve will share coffee with MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's,  Dr. Jill Andrew .

This week's conversation will be broadcast live to the Beth Tzedec  Facebook page  and  YouTube channel . Comment with your questions for Jill on either platform!

Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD  is the MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's. Jill serves as the the Ontario NDP Culture Critic and Women's Issues Critic for the Official Opposition. Jill is also a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, a first of it's kind in Ontario legislative history and she also sits on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.

Jill is the first Black and Queer person to be elected to the Ontario Legislature and reportedly in Canada. Since then, Jill has been a leading voice on issues of gender, race and social justice, the housing crisis, healthcare inequities, education and the immeasurable benefit of arts and culture to our communities but also to our physical, mental and social health.

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‘Our pain is real,’ Dozens of advocates gather for endometriosis rally in Toronto

October 16, 2023 Devon Banfield

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Dozens of advocates gathered in Queen’s Park for the Unite for Endometriosis: Political Action Rally over the weekend, organized by Endometriosis Events . 

Endometriosis is a chronic pain disease that impacts about one million people in Canada, as per The Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada . The condition can involve multiple organs throughout the body and is characterized by symptoms like severe chronic, irregular vaginal bleeding, and infertility. 

There is also often a delay in diagnosing endometriosis, with those suffering with the condition often waiting more than five years for doctors to determine the cause of their symptoms. There is currently no cure for the disease, and the symptoms are managed by a host of medical interventions, including different medications and surgeries. However, due to factors like a lack of specialists and long waitlists, many people living with this condition experience periods of time without medical assistance.

Demonstrators carried signs with messages like “Endometriosis is a social justice issue” and “No one should have to go into debt getting medical care in another country,” highlighting the reality for many people living with endometriosis. 

Saturday’s rally focused on raising awareness of endometriosis, and a petition that will be presented to the provincial government calling for better endometriosis care, funding, and education in Ontario. That petition has garnered thousands of signatures and will be tabled by Dr. Jill Andrew, PhD, MPP for Toronto-St. Paul’s. Andrew was also one of the rally speakers.

“We’re not doing this because we want to mooch on the system, we’re doing it because we need help, we need to be believed,” Andrew said, adding that those living with chronic pain never get used to it, rather, they learn to live with it.

READ MORE: ‘It feels like a slow and painful death,’ A glimpse into living with endometriosis

“We created a petition with MPP Dr. Jill Andrew, and we had a lot of asks on that petition, to raise more awareness, more funds, more education for endo warriors,” Tami Ellis, co-founder of Endometriosis Events, told Now Toronto.

Ellis lives with endometriosis and was diagnosed in 2017.

“[I] had three surgeries. It affects people mentally and physically, and more work needs to be done. There needs to be a cure and there need to be more doctors aware of this as well,” Ellis continued.

“Right now, unfortunately, endometriosis is not talked about as much as it needs to be, just like other menstrual health conditions,” Leah Haynes, co-founder of Endometriosis Events, said.

“It’s impacted my life both physically and mentally. It definitely has cost me time with friends and family,” Haynes explained, adding that she has to plan different life events and special occasions around her menstrual cycle.

“Of course, it affects my work and ability to do different things and be a productive member of society. So, I think this is important work that needs to be done and a conversation that needs to happen as well.”

She also shared something she wishes more people knew about the disease. 

“Our pain is real when we say it is.”

“Endometriosis took away everything that I wished I could be as a child, all of my hopes and dreams,” a rally attendee named Penny shared, adding that they are scheduled to have a hysterectomy in the coming weeks to manage their symptoms. 

READ MORE: ‘My uterus was causing me a lot of grief,’ Endometriosis patient shares post-hysterectomy story

“I have been in the hospital every single month, every single period,” they continued, adding that they’ve been fighting to have their pain recognized and heard for years.

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NSSMUN HOME

See you april 27th, 2024,     register now    .

Please welcome our guest speaker for the conference, Dr. Jill Andrew.

Dr. Jill Andrew, Phd

MPP for Toronto-St. Paul's, Dr. Andrew serves as the Ontario NDP Culture Critic and Women's Issues Critic for the Official Opposition. She is a member of the Ontario NDP Black Caucus, that works to incorporate Black perspectives into all of the NDP's work.

She is the first Black, queer person to be elected to the Ontario Legislature, and since then has been a leading voice on issues of social injustice, the housing crisis, healthcare inequities, education and the immeasurable benefit of arts and culture to our communities.

We welcome Dr. Jill Andrew into Northern Secondary to share her message.

@JILLSLASTWORD

MPP for Toronto-St. Paul’s🍊✊🏿|Body Equity| #SizeismSUCKS |Fashion Diversity| @BCCAwards RT ✖ end

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Someone who compares everyone’s right to choose to the Holocaust is not someone who should be the Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Education. Join us in calling on Doug Ford to fire Sam...

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Body Stories: In and Out and With and Through Fat Paperback – December 1, 2020

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• Print length 240 pages
• Language English
• Publisher AmazonUs/INDPB
• Publication date December 1, 2020
• Dimensions 6 x 0.58 x 9 inches
• ISBN-10 1772582549
• ISBN-13 978-1772582543
• See all details

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• Publisher ‏ : ‎ AmazonUs/INDPB; First Edition (December 1, 2020)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 240 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1772582549
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1772582543
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 13.8 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.58 x 9 inches
• #1,075 in Feminist Theory (Books)
• #1,752 in Motherhood (Books)
• #1,908 in General Women's Health

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