Ragen Chastain was born in Forest Grove, Oregon



Ragen is the author of the blog DancesWithFat and the book Fat: The Owner's Manual, and her writing has been published in forums including the NBC's iVillage, Today.com, Calgary Herald, Jezebel.com and The Frisky.com. She has been a guest on programs including Fox News, Alberta Primetime, HuffPost Live, NPR, BBC, and NBC News, and has been featured in media including The Associated Press, Bloomberg Businessweek, FITNESS, and the Chicago Tribune. She is the editor of the multi-volume anthology The Politics of Size - Perspectives from the Fat Acceptance Movement, due out by Praeger in late 2014.



Her work is regularly translated into multiple languages, most recently Icelandic, and her blog has readers on all seven continents. She is a body image and women's health blogger for NBCs iVillage and a columnist for Ms. Fit Magazine.