Beyond mere sustenance:

lood as communication,
Communication as ood
Cartvita P. Creeve ava ]avet M. Craver
Now the irst and greatest o necessities is ood, which is the condition o lie and
existence-Plato ,1be Revbtic,
\hen \illiams ,1958, identiied culture as ordinary,` he was elucidating the
potentially transparent nature o those eeryday elements that orm the ery
backbone o our existence ,p. 4,. One example o this taken or granted`
culture o eeryday lie is ood, which while consumed on a daily basis, oten is
considered as mere sustenance. It is, at once, associated with both a common
and an ordinary enterprise. loweer, ood is much more than just a means o
surial. It permeates all other aspects o our lies rom the most intimate to
the most proessional practices. It also is a key actor in how we iew ourseles
and others, is at the center o social and political issues, and is a mainstay o
popular media.
lrom high-tech kitchen gadgets to magazines to the ooa ^etror/, oer the
last ew decades, we hae witnessed a rise in ood-ocused consumption, media,
and culture, such that there has been what we could label a ood explosion.` It
seems as i ood, and the discourses surrounding it, are all oer the place rom
Jaime Olier`s entures into American school lunchrooms to news stories about
urban gardening or buying organic products at the local armer`s market. 1here
is a heightened awareness o ood`s signiicance within contemporary society
and culture and, as such, there is a urther need to explore it.
x lood as Communication,Communication as lood

Although the subject o ood has been widely studied within the ields o
anthropology, sociology, and cultural history, it has not been addressed ery
oten within the ield o communication. In her 190 essay, lenderson asserted
how and why ood, and our practices associated with its production and
consumption, should be iewed as a orm o communication and called or
scholars within the ield to take up ood as a serious orm o study ,pp. 3-8,.
lew scholars hae answered this call, and while other disciplines hae made
ood a ocus, communication largely still lags behind. loweer, as Lindeneld
and Langellier ,2009, suggest, oer the last ew years there has been a rise in
ood-related conerence panels and presentations within the discipline thus,
marking the growing interest in ood studies` ,p. 1,. \et, in addition to being
an emerging area o study, there are seeral major reasons why we can iew
ood rom the perspectie o communication and,or use ood as a means or
urther understanding communication theories and practices.
Broadly deined, communication is the process by which we understand the
world and our attempts to coney that understanding to others through both
erbal and nonerbal language. In this way, we can iew ood as a orm o
communication because it is a nonerbal means by which we share meanings
with others. As Roland Barthes has written, ood is
a system o communication, a body o images, a protocol o usages, situations, and
behaior. Inormation about ood must be gathered whereer it can be ound: by direct
obseration in the economy, in techniques, usages and adertising, and by indirect
obseration in the mental lie o a gien society. ,cited in Counihan and Van Lsterik,
2008, p. 29,
Paralleling Barthes, scholars such as Claude Lei-Strauss ,1983, and Mary
Douglas hae asserted that we can iew ood as adhering to the same practices
as language because ood is a code that can be seen to express patterns about
social relationships ,cited in Counihan and Van Lsterik, 2008, p. 44,. Spurlock
,2009,, in Perorming and Sustaining ,Agri,Culture and Place: 1he Cultiation
o Lnironmental Subjectiity on the Piedmont larm 1our` also proposes that:
Because o their ability to signiy, mediate, contest, and represent nature` and
culture,` oodways are deeply rhetorical and perormatie` ,p. 6,.
A primary reason that we should iew ood as a orm o communication is
because it is directly linked to both ritual and culture, where ritual is deined as
the oluntary perormance o appropriately patterned behaior to symbolically
eect or participate in the serious lie` ,Rothenbuhler, 1998, p. 2,. Nowhere
can this serious lie be iewed more closely than in rituals inoling ood. It is at
Beyond mere sustenance xi

the center o our most important eents such as birthdays, weddings, unerals,
and holidays. lood not only is a part o rituals, but also there are seeral
estials solely ocused on particular ood items such as the Gilroy Garlic
lestial or the lilton Apple lest. \ithin ritual contexts, ood oten acts
symbolically by representing or standing in` or expressions such as lie, loe,
grie, or happiness. Len within our daily experiences, the ways that we eat and
dine with others can be categorized as ritualistic because they inole repetition,
expected behaiors, and roles or both the participants and the ood
,Rothenbuhler, 1998,. 1hereore, i ood is used ritually, it also can be iewed as
a orm o culture een in its ordinary` state.
lollowing \illiams` ,1958, work, i we iew ood as a common acet o our
daily lies, and we see culture as ordinary,` then certainly ood is a means by
which we create cultures. In ooa i. Cvttvre, Montanari ,2006, asserts this
perspectie by claiming: lood is culture rbev it i. roavcea.rbev it i.
rearea.rbev it i. eatev.` ,pp. xi-xii, italics in original,. 1hat is to say,
throughout eery step o our encounters with ood, we shape it in one way or
another whether it is through selections o certain oods ersus others, cooking
processes, and,or the ways in which we consume it. Spurlock ,2009, also
maintains: 1hrough its absences and presences in eeryday lie, ood and
oodways highlight the moral, aesthetic, and ethical concerns o a gien cultural
milieu` ,p. ,. Moreoer, ood acts as a coneyor o culture reci.et, becav.e we
use it as means o communication.
In his oundational work, Covvvvicatiov a. Cvttvre: ..a,. ov Meaia ava
ociet,, Carey ,1992, argues: communication is a symbolic process whereby
reality is produced, maintained, repaired, and transormed` ,p. 23,. I we ollow
Carey`s ,1992, argument, then surely ood is one o the most readily-aailable
symbols that we hae at our disposal, which can be iewed rom both the
perspecties o communication and culture. In other words, we oten use ood
to communicate with others and as a means o demonstrating personal identity,
group ailiation and disassociation, and other social categories, such as
socioeconomic class. In this sense, ood is a product and mirror o the
organization o society., a prism that absorbs and relects a host o cultural
phenomena` ,Counihan, 1999, p. 6,. lood unctions symbolically as a
communicatie practice by which we create, manage, and share meanings with
others.
Perhaps one o the most common ways that we utilize ood is in the
construction o our personal identities. As Brillat-Saarin ,2000, claims in 1be
Pb,.iotog, of 1a.te, 1ell me what kind o ood you eat, and I will tell you what
xii lood as Communication,Communication as lood

kind o man you are` ,p. 3,. In other words, we regularly deine who we are`
according to both the oods that we eat and those that we rerain rom
consuming. lor example, a person may identiy as a egan,` a carniore,` an
omniore,` or simply as a oodie.` \e hae a direct, isceral connection to
ood, and it is oten linked to emotion and memory or seres as a source o
comort or some people.
Besides our indiidual connections to ood, we also use it as a means o
communicating our identities to others through our processes o preparation
and eating. 1his relationship is situational because we may use ood or
associated behaiors in dierent ways depending upon the social situations in
which we ind ourseles. lor example, consider how a person might present his
or her identity on a irst date, a business luncheon, or at a amily gathering. 1his
person may purchase certain oods rather than others in order to relect a class
status or position o authority. Moreoer, a person may also abstain rom eating
too much or may utilize ormalized etiquette on the date and at the luncheon,
whereas at the amily gathering, she or he may not eel the need to prescribe to
the rules o etiquette at all.
As well as constituting our own identities, we use ood as a means o
identiying with others. lood connects people, both physically and symbolically,
when we sit down to dine together ,Visser, 1991,. Similarly speaking, rhetorical
scholar Burke ,1969, argues that you persuade a person only so ar as you align
your identity with hers through the use o language ,p. 55,. Lxtending this
rationale to ood, we also identiy with others based upon the types o ood that
we eat such that we may eel a common bond with people who hae similar
eating habits to ours. lollowing the preious example, a person may identiy
himsel as a meat-eater` or egetarian` and thereore associate with people
who hae the same interests and,or iews about ood consumption. As a result,
our selections o ood are more complex than simply whether we order wine
with dinner or eat a salad instead o a hamburger.
It is through our processes o sharing or discussing ood that we can iew it
as a orm o discourse. Much o our notions about ood, and its relationship to
the natural world, are coneyed and learned through the sharing o narraties
and stories. In this sense, we could argue that ood seres as a socializing
mechanism by which we come to understand our cultures, our societies, and the
groups to which we belong. \hile this aspect occurs on a small scale,
discourses about ood also are prealent within larger social structures such as
goernment, media, and popular culture. Oten, these discourses come into
Beyond mere sustenance xiii

conlict with each other because they oer myriad perspecties about ood and
issues related to it.
As discourses, all o these dialogues about ood, and its associated practices,
operate as sites o struggle` with signiicant social and political implications
,liske, 199, pp. 5-6,. \hile we consider politics as haing an institutionalized
center that expounds power, our eeryday practices also hae political
dimensions ,De Certeau, as cited in lighmore, 2002, pp. 68-3,. In other
words, we need to conceptualize politics as located beyond the realms o
political campaigns and oting. As Cooks ,2009, argues in \ou are \hat \ou
,Don`t, Lat lood, Identity, and Resistance: lor those o us interested in
embracing our identities as political and in seeking openings in the tactical
moments and perormances o eeryday lie, eating and cooking oer
important sites o preseration and imagination` ,p. 108,. Political struggles also
occur oer how we make sense o our eeryday experiences by using arious
discourses to describe them ,liske, 1994,.
\ithin contemporary society, much o the political work that occurs takes
place in the practices o our daily lies such as discourses about our
relationships with ood. lor example, in Unhappy Meals,` Pollan ,200,
suggests that our relationship to ood is simple because all we really need to do
is Lat ood. Not too much. Mostly plants,` and we will be healthy ,p. 38,.
Similarly, while he parallels Pollan on many ood-related issues, Glassner ,200,
takes an alternatie iew o the recent backlash against ast ood by claiming: I
come to neither praise ast ood nor to bury it, only to question its easy
portrayal as the root o all eil` ,p. 146,.
Aside rom conlicting iews about our own eating habits, there are also
discursie struggles oer local ersus global ood production and consumption.
In 1he Pride and Prejudice o Local,`` \ardley ,2010, explains that recently
ches in Portland, Oregon iguratiely and literally came to blows` oer a local
cooking competition in which one o them used pig rom Iowa as the main
ingredient or his menu while the other priileged local products only ,p. A11,.
Additionally, while debates continue oer the question o genetically-modiied
oods, the Luropean Commission will ormally propose giing back to
national and local goernments the reedom to decide whether to grow such
crops. which many Luropeans derisiely call lrankenoods` ,Kanter, 2010, p.
B4,. 1hereore, it is through these multiple discourses that political decisions
are made whether they are on indiidual, local, or global scales. \e strongly
need to consider the political potential o ood because ood has the power to
xi lood as Communication,Communication as lood

inluence us and can condense in themseles a wealth o ideological meanings`
,\eismantel, 1988, pp. -8,.
I ood has become increasingly important within our processes o
communication as a means o expression, maniestation o identities, orm o
discourse and ritual, hallmark o social relationships, ava i ood is ubiquitous,
then it is or these rer, reasons that we need to more closely consider how ood
and its practices operate as a means o communication. lurthermore, there is a
need or communication scholars to apply our unique methodological and
theoretical approaches to the study o ood. In this sense, we beliee
communication studies can oer new insights into how ood proides much
more than nourishment, or mere sustenance, because ood demonstrates a
whole host o social, cultural, and political phenomena.
In this edited olume we bring together scholars with dierse research oci
and an array o perspecties on ood and communication to examine and
explore this emerging area o study. Gien the arious ways that ood acts as a
orm o communication, we propose in the chapters o this book to proide
deinitie and oundational examples o how ood operates as a system o
communication and how communication theories can be understood when
iewed through the lens o ood. In this sense, this book is not only about ood
but also about communication theories, practices, and eects.
Readers will note that selections in this reader encompass traditional
approaches to communication including rhetorical, interpersonal,
phenomenological ,ethnographic,, media and popular culture, enironmental,
organizational, intercultural, and critical,cultural perspecties. 1he selections,
howeer, are organized according to an oerall consideration o bor ood
communicates messages, then ocus on rbat those messages communicate
related to identities, alues, enironmental concerns, and oerall contexts. 1his
communication ocus is traditionally understood as communicator,
message,relationships,culture and society. International and intercultural
perspecties are integrated throughout, rather than treated as separate
phenomena.
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Using a ariety o approaches including marketing,strategic communication,
critical media studies, rhetorical analysis, and cultural,historical studies, the
essays in this irst section explore how ood unctions symbolically as a
Beyond mere sustenance x

communicatie practice. 1hey also address how ood, and its surrounding
aspects, oten unction as sites o struggle` within popular media and wider
cultural discourses. By analyzing the ways in which ood ilms engage with and
,re,produce discourse while simultaneously erasing the complexities o that
discourse, Lindeneld examines the role o ood ilms in communication studies
and oers a rationale or why scholars need to urther pursue this course o
study. 1homson`s essay explores how breakast cereal companies market
themseles to children and the relationship between kids` perormatiity online
to these products. In Chapter 3, Karaosmanoglu addresses cooking and eating
practices by way o Istanbul`s nostalgic culinary books in relation to the
memories o the city. Using the example o home-building practices in an
Australian monastery, \essell and Jones` chapter suggests the ways ood can
operate as a system o communication and how it can be used to understand
dierent theories and approaches to communication.
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Increasingly, ood has become a means by which we create and manage our
identities and how we iew the identities o others. 1he chapters in section two
analyze the ways in which ood communicates notions o sel and the arious
social categories to which we belong, ranging rom socioeconomic class to
nationality. It begins with Greene`s essay in which she analyzes how the Slow
lood Moement uses social style to construct both an identity or the
organization and its members. Lucas and Buzzanell, in Chapter 6, consider the
role o collectie memory o hard times in Irontown,` a small mining
community in the U.S. Rust Belt. 1hrough the analysis o six ocus groups,
Cosgri-lernandez, Martinez, Shar, and Sharkey, in Chapter , examine
conersations about nutritional belies and choices, as well as dierences
between lie in Mexico and the United States. In her essay, German argues that
a cookbook created by Mina Pachter and other anonymous women during their
camp internment in \orld \ar II rhetorically can be iewed as an act o
resistance. Parasecoli`s essay ends this section by examining how
representations o men around ood in ilms can establish, question, reinorce,
reproduce or destroy cultural assumptions about masculinity and gender
relations.


xi lood as Communication,Communication as lood

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lood and our interactions with it communicate, create, and relect a multiplicity
o meanings across a wide spectrum o societies and cultures. As such, the
chapters in this section examine the ways in which ood oten is imbued with
social and cultural alues as well as how these ideals are established through the
use o ood and its associated practices. 1hompson, in Chapter 10, rhetorically
examines how ast ood` and slow ood` operate as tropes in a globalizing
world. 1hrough an examination rom a cross-cultural,inter-cultural
communication perspectie o both rbat and bor people eat at Chinese
restaurants in New \ork City, Cheng`s essay demonstrates that, contrary to
what many U.S. citizens might beliee, Chinese restaurant culture in the United
States is actually quintessentially American.` Drawing on 18 months o
ethnographic research, McCullen, in Chapter 12, explains the process through
which an attempt to deetishize ood production ails by excluding the story o
labor relations on arms and, through market interactions and narraties, makes
Latino arm workers inisible. In Chapter 13, Mudry describes how discourses
o science and quantiication were integrated into American nutrition policy,
how this integration was abetted by technologies, and how these discourses
aligned the USDA nutrition policy with the goals o Progressie reormers.
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lood is nature`s bounty in peril. In this period o abundant ood, especially in
the United States, millions o people still stare, suering hunger and
depriation that some may think is experienced only in deeloping nations. 1he
chapters in section our regard human action and impact on ood in the
enironment by considering the relationships among humans, ood, and the
natural world, including ood actiism, enironmental justice, and media
discourses about ood. In the opening chapter, Brummett uses a homological
analysis to make some obserations and suggestions about the current state o
political discourse using the examples o hunting and gardening. In Chapter 15,
Bruner and Meek explore contemporary public discourse surrounding seaood
with a ocus on the complicated enironmental-demands and nutrition-
Beyond mere sustenance xii

demands aced by seaood consumers. 1odd`s essay uses rhetorical analysis to
reeal why the Lat the View` campaign successully persuaded the Obamas to
plant a egetable garden on the \hite louse lawn. Cramer, in Chapter 1,
analyzes discourses o ood on the lood Network rom a ramework that
assumes that human relationships with ood and, especially, the process o
producing and preparing one`s own ood, is key to understanding or
reconceptualizing a relationship between humans and the earth that is more
sustainable.
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\e communicate about ood and ood choices in arious personal and societal
contexts, such as amily relationships, educational institutions, and
organizations. 1he chapters in this inal section emphasize that while
interpersonal inluences on ood choices are oten initiated within the amily,
they also deelop in the context o societal alues and market structure.
1hrough the use o a ocus-group study, Kaplan, James, Alloway, and Kiernan
explore how a ramework or understanding child inolement and
empowerment can be used to deelop two amily-based nutrition education
programs. LeGreco, in Chapter 19, demonstrates how a ariety o school meal
stakeholders in Arizona use ood as a means to communicate agency through
three dominant discourses that organize eating. Schuwerk`s essay employs
qualitatie research, conducted in the Southwestern United States, to proide
aluable inormation in relation to organizational culture and its implications on
ood banking and the community. Singer oers a case study on Monsanto, the
U.S.-based multinational irm, to detail some o the ways by which corporate
agriscience strategically positions itsel in relation to stakeholders on issues o
hunger and agricultural deelopment. linally, in Chapter 22, \alters uses an
interpretie approach to examine how high school students construct meaning
through interaction with ood and the enironment to urther understand
inluences on the dietary patterns o youth.
As stated earlier, ood proides a rich ehicle by and through which
communication occurs. lood is both constituted by a people or culture and it is
constitutie o people and cultures. It transcends nation, race, class, and gender,
een as it deines them. 1he possibilities or communication scholars seem
endless when ood is conceptualized in this way. One ruitul area to consider is
the ery deinition o communication itsel. lor some, communication is a
xiii lood as Communication,Communication as lood

process that attempts to create-and sometimes, perhaps requently,
achiees-shared meaning, a process that is inluenced by myriad actors such
as social and cultural context, participants, motiations, purposes, and goals ,or
the lack thereo,. But as other communication scholars hae rightly obsered,
communication is also the process by which a society or culture comes into
being. In this sense, communication has constitutie power and is not merely a
process o creating something external-or ancillary to-the makeup o a
society or culture. Considered semiotically, communication could also be
construed as the process by which objects are inused with meaning or the
arena in and through which symbols unction. And, or some, communication
is its technology-the media through which the process occurs and through
which we connect with others. linally, communication may be understood in its
simplest expression, as a conersation. 1he chapters in this book hae
considered both ood and communication in aried ways, leading us to
conclude that whateer deinition or perspectie o communication is
priileged, ood remains one o its most lexible and useul models.
It is hoped that this edited olume not only will contribute to studies o
ood in communication but also will sere as a means or spurring uture
dialogues on this subject due to its ast array o ideas about ood and its
relationship to our communication practices. \e hope, too, that scholars will
reconsider models o communication based on the insights that ood and its
discourses proide.
E">"/"'#"-
Barthes, R. ,2008,. 1oward a psychosociology o contemporary ood consumption. In C.
Counihan & P. Van Lsterik ,Lds.,, ooa ava cvttvre: a reaaer ,2
nd
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Routledge.
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Burke, K. ,1969,. . rbetoric of votire.. Berkeley, CA: 1he Uniersity o Caliornia Press.
Carey, J. ,1992,. Covvvvicatiov a. cvttvre: ..a,. ov veaia ava .ociet,. New \ork: Routledge.
Cooks, L. ,2009,. \ou are what you ,don`t, eat lood, identity, and resistance. 1et ava Perforvavce
Qvartert,, 2, 1, 94-110.
Counihan, C. ,1999,. 1be avtbrootog, of fooa ava boa,: Cevaer, veavivg, ava orer. New \ork,
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,Ld.,. 1be erer,aa, tife reaaer ,pp. 63-5,. London: Routledge.
Douglas, M. ,2008,. Deciphering a meal. In C. Counihan & P. Van Lsterik ,Lds.,, ooa ava cvttvre:
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