The term "bodybuilding" has taken on several meanings in popular discourse. The most common usage refers to the organized sport in which men and women compete by posing to display the physiques they have created through weight training, careful dieting, and, in some cases, ergogenic drugs such as anabolic steroids. The term is also used generically to describe the lifestyle followed by many men and women who simply train for greater muscle mass and leanness even though they never compete. These non-competitors train for the "look"—a physical ideal featuring large rounded muscles and minimal body fat. Although the "look" requires enormous dedication and personal sacrifice—and, frequently, drugs—to achieve, it has become pervasive in Western culture. Films, television, comic books, and magazine advertising had all fallen under its sway by the end of the twentieth century.

Although surviving sculpture from Ancient Greece and Rome suggests that...