Oh, what great comments! I don't follow Sart, just click over when someone here (Una, usually!) refers to a post. This one, though! What a great photo, and what a beautiful pair of shoes!
In all seriousness, though, here is the comment I left on his blog:
"This is such a great thing to talk about, although the likelihood that we will all agree on a description is slim...
What I want to say, is that I am a "curvy" woman (i.e. muscular with an hourglass body shape) who is slim and petite (at only 5'2"). It used to be that curvy was used to describe women who had noticeable hip-to-waist ratios, breasts and/or were muscular and therefore curvaceous. Remember when Cindy Crawford was "the curvy model" because she had breasts and wasn't straight up and down?
Now, it seems that the word curvy has been appropriated by overweight people. Granted, such a body may have many more curves than mine. I wonder, though, where that leaves me? If fat is the new curvy, and skinny is still skinny, how do we describe a slim-yet-shapely woman?
I think that describing this woman as curvy is appropriate. Her legs are gorgeously curvaceous. As you pointed out, she is also "big", in that she is tall.
Perhaps if we didn't feel compelled to use euphemisms to describe body compositions, we could call a spade a spade and be done with it."
So, I agree with all of the points you all have already made. Why doesn't he usually comment on a subject's body shape/size? Why is curvy used to describe "plus-sized" women? When there is an actual need to describe a body's shape, what words are we to use?
I don't like to get into the height/weight descriptors, either, because the numbers don't give an accurate picture. I was just talking with my husband about this today, and will use myself as an example: I am a long-time yoga practitioner and teacher, a dancer, an athlete. I lift weights, people! At 5'2", I weigh about 137 in the winter. In the summer, probably around 130-ish. That sounds heavy for a short gal, but I wear a size 4 or 6, which is not a big size. My weight doesn't mean anything, really, in the scheme of my health or even my relative size. I am small, but...densely packed. I am "curvy", and I like it!
