Big Beautiful Woman

"bbws" redirects here. For the singular form, see BBW (disambiguation).

"Big Beautiful Woman" (BBW) is a positive (non-pejorative) term for an overweight woman.^[1] The male equivalent of this term is "Big Beautiful Man" or "Big Handsome Man".^[2]

Sculpture by Fernando Botero

Meaning and usage

The terms "Big Beautiful Women" and "BBW" were coined by Carole Shaw in 1979, when she launched BBW Magazine, a fashion and lifestyle magazine for "plus-size" women.^[3] BBW Magazine trademarked the term "Big Beautiful Woman", which was later transferred to Dimensions Magazine.^[4]

The term is also commonly used as a positive euphemism by those involved with the fat acceptance movement.^[2]

Venus figurine of Willendorf estimated to have been made c. 30,000 years ago

Rubens's "Venus at the Mirror" (circa 1615)

The term has several near-synonyms with varying shades of meaning, such as "full-figured", "voluptuous", "zaftig", and "Rubenesque", the latter term referring to the art of Peter Paul Rubens, best known for portraying full-bodied women.^[5]

Variants

The acronym BBBW stands for Big Beautiful Black Woman.^[6] Another variant is SSBBW: Supersized Big Beautiful Woman. There is no formal definition which explains the exact difference between BBW and SSBBW. Some BBWs or SSBBWs consider themselves to be feedees.^[7] Dimensions Magazine considers a woman over 350 pounds (160 kg) to be an SSBBW.^[4]

See also

• Fat acceptance movement
• Fat fetishism
• Female body shape
• Venus figurine
• Bear (gay culture)
• Obesity