Constructing Breast Cancer in the News Betty Ford and the Evolution of the Breast Cancer Patient Academic Article

abstract

• In this article, the author explores a key moment in breast cancer historythe publicity surrounding Betty Ford's radical mastectomy in 1974and points to the ways in which the print news coverage of Ford's mastectomy offers an identity, or subject position, for breast cancer patients that is constrained by stereotypical gender roles, particularly the need for breast cancer patients to maintain their femininity. Betty Ford is articulated as an ideal patient within a medical success narrative that tells a story of breast cancer diagnosis and treatment in a progressive, linear fashion that minimizes the complexity of breast cancer as a disease and the questions surrounding best treatment practices. The aestheticization of breast cancer in the coverage of Betty Ford's mastectomy is one of the primary discursive building blocks of the contemporary subjectivity of the breast cancer survivor.

authors

• Dubriwny, Tasha

published proceedings

• JOURNAL OF COMMUNICATION INQUIRY

author list (cited authors)

• Dubriwny, T. N.

citation count

• 9

complete list of authors

• Dubriwny, Tasha N

publication date

• April 2009

publisher

• SAGE Publications  Publisher

published in

• Journal of Communication Inquiry  Journal

keywords

• Betty Ford
• Breast Cancer
• Constitutive Rhetoric
• Narrative
• Subject Position

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

• 10.1177/0196859908329090

start page

• 104

end page

• 125

volume

• 33

issue

• 2

URL

• http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0196859908329090