Butts

A Backstory

By: Heather Radke

Narrated by: Heather Radke, Emily Tremaine

“Winning, cheeky, and illuminating….What appears initially as a folly with a look-at-this cover and title becomes, thanks to Radke’s intelligence and curiosity, something much meatier, entertaining, and wise.” —The Washington Post

“Lively and thorough, Butts is the best kind of nonfiction.” —Esquire, Best Books of 2022

A “carefully researched and reported work of cultural history” (The New York Times) that explores how one body part has influenced the female—and human—experience for centuries, and what that obsession reveals about our lives today.

Whether we love them or hate them, think they’re sexy, think they’re strange, consider them too big, too small, or anywhere in between, humans have a complicated relationship with butts. It is a body part unique to humans, critical to our evolution and survival, and yet it has come to signify so much more: sex, desire, comedy, shame. A woman’s butt, in particular, is forever being assessed, criticized, and objectified, from anxious self-examinations trying on jeans in department store dressing rooms to enduring crass remarks while walking down a street or high school hallways. But why? In Butts: A Backstory, reporter, essayist, and RadioLab contributing editor Heather Radke is determined to find out.

Spanning nearly two centuries, this “whip-smart” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) cultural history takes us from the performance halls of 19th-century London to the aerobics studios of the 1980s, the music video set of Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” and the mountains of Arizona, where every year humans and horses race in a feat of gluteal endurance. Along the way, she meets evolutionary biologists who study how butts first developed; models whose measurements have defined jean sizing for millions of women; and the fitness gurus who created fads like “Buns of Steel.” She also examines the central importance of race through figures like Sarah Bartmann, once known as the “Venus Hottentot,” Josephine Baker, Jennifer Lopez, and other women of color whose butts have been idolized, envied, and despised.

Part deep dive reportage, part personal journey, part cabinet of curiosities, Butts is an entertaining, illuminating, and thoughtful examination of why certain silhouettes come in and out of fashion—and how larger ideas about race, control, liberation, and power affect our most private feelings about ourselves and others.

©2022 Heather Radke. All rights reserved. (P)2022 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

Excellent overview

I found this to be an excellent overview, combining a number of different disciplines in a hope for a holistic view. It was fascinating and engrossing and at times appalling and funny. 10/10, can recommend

I love Butts 🍑

This was such an easy listen and so informative and entertaining. I can see myself listening to it again and again!

Excellent, clever, honest book about the female butt! Illuminating!

This book is so thoroughly researched, thoughtful and funny. The writer is excellent, and thorough. This book is so worth your time, and gives voice and explanation as to why our views of the female body are so warped/complex.

Pretty interesting

I think I was expecting a bit more of a scientific take, but I appreciated the acknowledgement of multiple different cultural lenses.

Excellent and Insightful

This book follows the evolution of human experiences with our bodies and expectations. Excellent read, well researched, and well written.

Informative about your backside.

This is a delightful romp into the world of butts. Delightfully insightful at the beginning, the book loses a little steam as we move to the future because the present is still in our mind. That said, Heather remains thoughtful and thorough from beginning to end. A quick and delightful lesson.

A micro-history of butts

Butts delivers what micro-history fans like: a bit of personal story and a series of historical sketches that tries to make sense of how we think about butts.

A history of butts

This is a deep dive into how we landed in our current (western, American, hegemonic) perception of the ideal female butt: not too big, not too small, just right—with a healthy dose of historical context. The narration is excellent, and the telling of the history of Sarah Baartman alone makes the book worth it

A fascinating history of race femininity and sexuality that doesn’t lose its sense of humor.

The book is great going from the evolutionary purpose and understanding of butts through cultural representations of butts big and small. Personally I think the author is a little harsh on some individual celebrities, but she does reference and cite her arguments so I can’t fault her for misrepresenting.

The book is very clear that this is one woman’s journey to understand something deeply personal to her, butt(see what I did there) that makes it no less rigorous in its academic pursuit.

Answers to age-old questions

Phenomenal heart, extensive research & a whole lot of 🍑 to boot! What more could you ask? This is a non-fiction for everyone…even those of us that rarely peruse this category. Lovely job, lovely author💕