" Slouch is a gripping read that made me sit up a little straighter in my chair--and taught me how that very impulse, while no longer imposed by campus medical inspectors or stiff 'posture fashion,' has come to be so ingrained in the American psyche. Our attitudes about health, beauty, ability, race, and more are vividly, and often surprisingly, revealed through how we have surveilled the shape of our spines. Beth Linker's rigorous and accessible history illuminates our culture, politics, and society." --Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, author of Fit Nation: The Gains and Pains of America's Exercise Obsession "From a preeminent historian of disability, Slouch lights up the corners where ableism still lurks. Inventive, persuasive, and important, Beth Linker's wide-ranging book follows the curves of American posture science through the intersections of race, class, gender, sexuality, and citizenship. This book is ardently needed--to support more liberatory notions of beauty, belonging, power, consent, and what it means to be human." --Laura Stark, author of Behind Closed Doors: IRBs and the Making of Ethical Research "Who would have thought that slouching could be so riveting? Acclaimed historian Beth Linker has written an enthralling account of posture, prejudice, panic, and disability. Essential reading for anyone curious about bodies.

" -- Joanna Bourke, author of The Story of Pain: From Prayer to Painkillers " Slouch persuasively shows that the Ivy League nude posture photo scandal was just a small part of the story of a twentieth-century public health program--one based on the false idea that there is a single optimal posture for everyone. Beth Linker does a wonderful job of straightening out the story of bent backs!" --Jonathan Marks, author of Is Science Racist? " Slouch unearths the history of posture to reveal how it was more than a signifier of good breeding and class civility: it was a central aspect of social and personal hygiene that, if neglected, could become a public health crisis. A richly detailed book about what it meant--and means--to be 'posture conscious.'" --Jaipreet Virdi, author of Hearing Happiness: Deafness Cures in History.