Most of us have been socialized to believe that male and female bodies are essentially different; that, bodily and naturally, men must be masculine, and women feminine. For men, muscles are equated with masculinity; they 'have come to be seen as an accomplishment, not natural endowments but cultured products' (Longhurst et al., p. 229). Women, on the other hand, are generally expected to be feminine in radical contrast to the masculinity that men are supposed to embody. In the midst of all this, female bodybuilding has come into the picture to disrupt the simplistic binary opposition between hard male body and soft female body. The hyper-muscular body of female bodybuilders has indeed been constructed by some scholars as feminist resistance to traditional ideas of femininity, challenging at the same time the assumed stable sex/gender continuum. Task 1 requires you to first surf the internet to acquaint yourself and analyze images of female bodybuilders. A simple internet search will yield such sites as and , among the many available. Then, consider your personal reactions to these images of female bodybuilders. Do you find them attractive, unappealing or perhaps offensive? Or are you neutral to these gender 'transgressions'? Why do you think you react the way you do, and how do your personal reactions relate to the idea that 'power is imprinted or "inscribed" on the human body' (Longhurst et al., p. 199)? Write your responses to these questions in about 1,000 words. Note that there are no right or wrong reactions. Your essay will be marked based on how you explore and theorize your reactions in the context of cultured bodies.