Belasco 2008, states that “Interdisciplinary emerges as one of the main defining characteristics
of food studies” .
It may be premature to announce the birth of a new discipline.
Instead use interdisciplinary approaches to study food. Which requires crossing boundaries of
disciplines and integrating these and models carefully since there are “disparate” or UNALIKE
ideas and insights.
Some see interdisciplinary is a strength but others see it as a shortcoming (Jones 2009).
Food studies has always been a collection of disciplines. Developments over the past decade in
the production of food, composition of diet, politics and content of policy making have revealed
inadequacies of food studies.
Instead of being the end focus, food was “a novel means to illumintate already accepted
disciplinary concerns”’ (Belasco and Scantron 2002).
Only when researchers can see that food studies from production to consumption are
important in themselves will it become a new disciplinary approach.
Disciplinary projects are those which include only one branch of engineering where
as Interdisciplinary projects are those which involve more than one branch.
There has been impressive dynamism in food studies scholarship in the first two decades of the
21st century.
Follows in footsteps of earlier interdisciplinary food systems thinking and research in Canada
dating back to mid-1970s.
A unique aspect of food studies is the inclusion of both academic and non-academic work.
Pioneering publications reflect an orientation toward social justice, democratic citizenship, and
critical inquiry, and they were not configured to academia. (Mitchell’s politics of food,
Warnock’s profit hunger… pg 5. Examples of culinary, cultural, historical side of food studies
that remains largely outside the critical tradition.
Being critical carries a negative connotation that is associated with the tendency to seekout
shortcomings and limitations of others. Being critical has FOUR components.
1. Questions whether the arguments of a study are based on evidence rather than on
biases. Therefore critical perspectives require reassessment and re-evaluation of
analyses as new evidence becomes available.
-questioning someones views (empiricist) that is only based on senses since it will only
reflect what is happening not an analysis of WHY something happens.
The empirical approach is necessary for a critical perspective but not all empirical research is
critical. Agriculture and nutrition have been tightly bound to traditional disciplinary paradigms
relying on empiricism and conformity to dominant ways of thinking.
2. Being critical involves Questioning the basic values that lie behind the dominant
ideologies and discourses that inform scholarly thinking.
- Institutions such as schools, families and the media enforce processes of socialization
and training that normalize every day experiences. Coffee: disguses the reasons behind
this legal stimulant as well as labour conditions.
- Being critical involves a self-reflexive process of interrogating the key assumptions of
society, its institutions and everyday realities.
- We should not assume the right answer can be found by authority or habit, critical
thinking recognizes “all knowledge is contextual and subjective” (multiple answers exist
for every question)
The emergence of critical food studies / interdisciplinary of food studies is maturing and
remaining relevant as it addresses real problems that people face everyday!!!
Agrofuels and land grabbing also play a large role in continual restructuring of agricultural
systems in the Global South.
Governance linked with political-economic structures because corporations and other food
players have a say in nutrition policies, private certificates, food labelling and standards
industry.
Food sovereignty bridges political economy and governance. Democratic decision making
power. Bad news for small-scale diverse agricultural systems.
Environmental Approaches
-Pollution and climate change. Food system dependent on health of our environment
-destructive practices (fossil fuels, pesticides, high rates of water consumption)
-Sustainability (number 1), biodiversity, genetically modified organisms, food waste and
fisheries and natural resource management.
-Political Ecology (matters are not apolitical)
Sustainable agriculture methods:
1.organic agriculture
2.biodynamic agriculture (healthy food, healthy soil and healthy farms) Rudolf Steiner
3. permaculture ( stimulate or utilize the patterns and features observed in natural ecosystems)
Some argue that the most destructive pat of current food system is the growing production of
animal protein.
Eating more sustainably can also mean eating closer to where one lives, minimizing the distance
between oneself and the distance between food needs to travel to one’s plate. Local food**
Alternative Food Networks: groups of interrelated people and organizations that aim to bring
structural and institutional changes to the existing mainstream practices in the food system.
- Alternative food networks are more environmentally friendly and sustainable
- Farmers markets, direct marketing schemes, vegetable box delivery, community gardens
and food cooperatives.
- Urban agriculture has been a popular AFN with discussing growing food in cities.
Health Approaches
Industrial food system: uses chemical inputs and antibiotics, as well a society that eats highly
processed and packaged food. Tremendous impacts on public health.
Structural factors of the environment: Non-communicable diseases such as obesity, diabetes,
heart disease.
Some scholars identify food and health on a different level – healthy eating and diets.
Popkin coined the term nutrition transition. Observes dietary changes based on high
consumption of saturated fats, sugar, and refined food – often called the western diet –
developing world and increasing rates of non-communicable diseases.
Nutritionism- sees food and diets reduced to their components and their biological functionality
addressed in terms of diseases. This doesn’t place an emphasis on the importance of cultural,
ecological, and health.
Critical Dietetics (remove the narrow approach) – seeks to consider the social, cultural,
historical and environmental concerns that inform nutrition.
Food security: all people have access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food
Food insecurity: when people do not have adequate physical, social or economic access to food.
Scholars identify food insecurity as falling into neo-liberal paradigms of increased free trade and
technological production.
Food sovereignty relocates power away from corporations and into the hands of people who
are directly affected by food insecurity.
Community food security: food access and availability at the community level using local and
place based solutions and policies.
Food literacy is a critical component in empowering people to make positive changes in the
food system.
Food literacy: the competence knowledge and skills required to understand the movement
from field to table and how this process affects humans, other forms of life, and the
environment.
NOTES ON CHAPTER 2
“food crisis began in 1973, which created volatile prices after decades of stability, and which
raised issues of hunger and food security.
-ongoing farm crisis and environmental critiques of industrial agriculture (chemicals, fertilizers
etc).
-National studies were limited, a transnational approach was commodity studies : in which
researchers track production, trade, consumption, and ideas about single commodity such as
wheat, milk or tomatoes.
- Larger approach: FOOD REGIMES: combines commodity studies with world-systems analysis
to identify long periods of stability and change in agri-food systems.
Social Context
The first “world food crisis” 1972, prices of soy, maize, and wheat doubled or tripled.
Meat became more expensive because it’s wheat fed.
Farmers did not benefit: it was corporations, especially international trade.
Prices fell but remained volatile. The world of food became unstable and unpredictable.
World Food Summit (Rome, 1974) launched movements for food security. “Right to food”
agreed by governments, not a top priority as long as hunger declined.
The goal of food security: social welfare, equality and justice including social movements
specifically hunger. Complemented by food sovereignty (trade agreements 1900s).
Humanitarian motives mixed with need to dispose of too many farm products did harm as well
as good.
The WFP is multilateral and focuses on food emergencies. Refereed to as “dumping” rather
than aid but now emergency aid usually buys food from farmers in distressed areas rather than
sending food that undercuts prices and incomes.
National Farmers Union launched largest social movement in the world (La Via Campesina) and
defined new goal of food sovereignty. The goal of ending hunger receded farther into the
future.
FoodShare Toronto and Toronto Food Polocy Council recognized across North America as
pioneer non-profit organizations. The Stop grew from a foodbank (which it still is) to a complex
organization.
This shows how regional food systems can pursue goals of sustainability, food security and food
justice.
All political parties except conservatives NOW had a food policy (2011). The Greens had the
best food policy.
NDP focused on health as a linkage between farming and food.
Commodity Studies
Counihan showed how bread production, distribution and consumption can serve as a lens to
understand massive changes in family, community, and work in a small community in Italy.
The book Sweetness and Power shed new light on capitalism and colonialism.
Sugar reshaped culture for both the rich and poor. (pg22)
Lettuce easily harvested by machines, labour not family labour , except of families of migrant
Mexican with limited rights.
Industrial systems made lettuce cheap (monocropping in California) expense of small and mixed
farms closer to consumers.
Durability and ease of shipping and storing took precedence over consumption : Iceberg lettuce
became dominant in supermarkets shaping consumer choice.
British government would sacrifice it’s own farmers for cheaper imports. Paradoxical : Family
labour on one side of the world and wage labour on the other – changing diets of industrial
workers in England.
Situation due to migration, railway building and new forms of credit.
Commodity or value chain studies allow researchers to track food where it goes, and
understand larger patterns of production, distribution and consumption.
Food regime analysis combines both the “bottom-up approach” of commodity studies with the
“top-down” approach of world-systems theory.
World Systems Theory: capitalism. Key is it’s recognition that for the first time in history the
market became bigger than any national territory, that the system of national states arose and
that the power hierarchy among states shapes the market and is shaped by it.
Capitalism is because of the relationships among industrial wage labour in England, slavery in
the Carribean, servitude in Eastern Europe, and sharecropping in Italy: each region and
commodity complex existed only because of the relations among them, including the
differences in power of states.
-spatial dimension of the world-system.
-time dimension is equally important
World-system goes through phases of contractions and expansions that coincide with shifts in
power (CALLED TRANSITIONS BETWEEN HEGEMONIC POWERS).
Toward a New Food Regime (as a lens to address many social problems at once)
Some assert the existence of a “corporate food regime” others criticize this view.
-early certifications were ORGANIC created by “alternative” farmers to help their customers
identify products and for fair trade. Created by social justice organizations in order to get better
prices for products such as coffee and cocoa. Problem for consumers: too many certifications
“label fatigue” and uncertainty that these certifications really deliver promised benefits.
Governments have a hard time keeping up with health and environment problems.
Corporations led by supermarkets have the role of making and implementing standards , and
social movements have shifted their advocacy from public policy to corporations. (corporate
self-regulation has not stabilized a new regime.
“Power of the public plate” ( Alliances between non-profit food advocacy organizations and
public institutions are an effective means to this end)
- Encourage schools, hospitals, and municipal agencies to provide healthy meals for
students, patients and workers and at the same time create demand for local
ingredients by sustainable farmers.
- Local Food Plus - Toronto (although they left the market they instilled behavior in
universities, government, and hospitals)
Canada the only so-called rich country to never have a national meal program in schools.
Communities of food practice: networks of individuals and organizations – public, private, and
non-profit, engaged in creating a regional, networked, inclusive agri-food economy.
New distribution systems create closer connections. ( Create short, local, alternative supply
chains). These movements may be seeds of democratic rather than corporate food regime.
CHANGE ALWAYS INVOLVES TENSION
Most organizations are converging on a concept of food citizenship.
Food citizenship: sense of belonging and participating in the food system through food-system
localization, based on values focused on the community and environmental sustainability.
First nations are potentially the centre in Canada of better ways of using land to create a better
food system.
Creativity and trust are important. Easing the tension among movements.
MODULE 1
Topics
Introductions to the course and to each other
An overview of the factors that influence food choices
The development of food studies and its key characteristics
Learning Objectives
By the end of this module, you should be able to:
Describe why food habits are not only determined by individual choices but also
by larger social discourses, structures, relationships, and institutions.
Define important terms for the field such as food system and food studies.
Explain some key elements of food studies and its development.
Locate your own food choices within larger social structures and relationships.
Think
Think about the following questions on your own:
What did you eat and/or drink at your most recent meal?
Why did you eat and/or drink those foods in particular?
Make a list of the factors that influenced your choice or the choice of the person who
made the food, if it wasn't you. Try to name at least five factors. Keep the list for later as
you will be referring to it at the end of this module.
But food habits are also shaped by other things, often beyond our direct and conscious
control. This becomes more clear if we consider how people eat in different geographic
areas, in different social groups, and in different time periods.
For example, why do you think the following things are true?
Canadians eat more meat now than in the past (Weis, 2015).
On average Canadians eat two times more meat than Japanese people and twenty
times more meat than people in India (FAO, 2013).
If food choices were only individually based, we wouldn't see these kinds of larger
patterns.
When thinking about reasons, did you consider the role of culture, including changing
ideas about health and masculinity and femininity? What about the role of the economy
and government policies or institutions?
Sociologists emphasize that eating does not simply fill a biological need: it carries
diverse social and cultural meanings.
Our food habits and our food system are influenced by a complex set of social relations,
processes, structures, and institutions. Food scholars also emphasize that the food
system is structured by relations of power, which lead to inequalities—both within and
across nations—and contribute to both a direct impact on individuals in societies as well
as broader impacts on the environment and non-human world.
This resulted in an abundance of certain grains, most notably corn. Because there was
a corn surplus, and because governments were subsidizing corn production, corn
prices fell. Meat producers began to see corn as a cheap source of cattle feed.
Since corn was cheap, beef became cheaper to produce. Some food activists (Pollan,
2002) suggest that this has contributed greatly to the meatification of our diets. (Per
capita global meat consumption has more than doubled since the 1950s (Weis, 2015).
Another result of this is the growth of the alternative/health food industry. Grass-fed
beef, which used to be the norm, is now typically available in specialty stores at
a premium price.
Macro-level issues, such as politics, economics, and international relations and trade,
are often called the structural factors influencing our diets. They are beyond the direct
control of individual eaters.
It's important to remember that the influences of these structural factors can also go in
different directions. A more complete picture of the relationships between them is
illustrated in Figure 1.3, below:
International trade and relations, politics, economics, food production, food distribution,
food retailing, and other issues all mutually influence our diets and each other.
Chapter 2 of the textbook describes two key macro approaches that scholars take to the
food system: commodity-chain studies and food-regime analysis. You might think of
the description above on corn (a commodity) as a snippet of a commodity-chain
analysis. Food regime analysis focuses on the hegemonic (dominant) political and
economic arrangements that shape food systems.
Mind-body dualism
In earlier philosophies of education, there was the idea that academic institutions
existed to feed the mind. In this way of thinking, the mind is seen as separate from, and
superior to, the body. Bodily concerns, like eating or sex, are seen as "debasing" or
"primitive"—not proper subjects of academic inquiry. In addition, “mind” concerns, such
as academic theory, and “body” concerns, such as eating, are supposed to be kept
separate. You might notice that this idea persists to some degree today. Think, for
example, of how eating is typically banned during university classes.
Why is Food Studies Gaining Prominence Now?
Feminist activists and scholars, especially in the 1960s and 70s, began to challenge the
public/private, consumption/production divide. They showed that activities in the home
were not only important to people's well-being, but they also had larger economic value.
For example, they argued that if women didn't do unpaid work in the home, such as
grocery shopping and cooking, (male) workers wouldn't be able to be productive in the
workforce (i.e., they would spend too much time cooking for themselves or go hungry)
(Luxton, 1980). These scholars and others also began to question the idea that the
mind and body are, in fact, separate.
On top of this, the 1960s saw a burgeoning of interest in the effects of new technologies
(e.g., pesticides) on our health and the environment (Carson, 1962). At the same time,
consumer activists began to decry the increasing influence of corporations on our lives.
Concerned citizens began to scrutinize products and modes of production based on
health, environmental and ethical concerns. In more recent years, a slew of popular
books and films (e.g., Fast Food Nation, Food Inc., 100-Mile Diet, Supersize Me, The
Omnivore's Dilema and Cooked) have increased people's awareness of the inner
workings and widespread consequences of the food industry.
All of these factors have lead to an increased interest, among both the public and
scholars, about the place of food and the food system in our lives.
In the Chapter 1 of the textbook, you were introduced to a definition the food system as
it is examined in food studies. We will use these definitions as anchors throughout the
course. Do you remember them? Use your memory and what you already know from
previous experiences and knowledge of food to answer the questions below. If
necessary, go back to the textbook or your reading notes.
Food System is “the historically specific web of social relations, processes, structures, and
institutional arrangements that cover human interactions with nature and with other humans
involving production, distribution, preparation, and consumption of food” (Koc et al., 2017, p.
xiv).
In the Warm Up page earlier in this module, you were asked to consider the following questions
and come up with a list of at least five factors influencing your food choices:
What did you eat and/or drink at your most recent meal?
Why did you eat and/or drink those foods in particular?
Go back to your list. Now that you’ve learned a few things from this module, try to add three or
more factors to your list. See if you can think of both micro-level factors and macro-level factors.
MODULE 2
Topics
The social construction of “healthy eating” and healthy eating
discourse
Differential access to healthy foods based on income and
neighbourhood
Different ideas about healthy eating and body type based on
ethno-racial background and age
The influence of employment and demographics on healthy eating
Learning Objectives
By the end of this module, you should be able to:
Warm Up
When Canadians are asked about healthy eating, they often refer
to Canada’s Food Guide (2007). It is no wonder, since children learn
about this guide in school and it is promoted widely by the Canadian
government. We may likely take it to represent facts about nutrition and
how to eat well.
However, the guide has changed significantly over the years and is
updated every 5 to 10 years (we are due for a new one!). Take a look at
this Health Canada webpage, where you can find different versions of
the guide over the 50 year period from 1942 to 1992. Do you notice any
differences between the guides in terms of suggestions for healthy
eating?
You might have noticed, for example, that in 1944, the guide
emphasizes that bread be eaten “with butter.” But in later years, butter is
not mentioned and “low-fat” milk products are promoted instead. These
differences suggest that there are no absolute facts about healthy
eating, only “discourses” that change over time and place. On the next
page, we’ll begin our discussion by looking at the idea of “discourse.”
Traditional
Emphasis on homemade foods, and meat as an important component of healthy
meals.
Mainly (Older) African-Nova Scotians and Punjabi-British Columbians, some
European-Nova Scotians
Alternative
Emphasis on eating organic and avoiding agri-food chemicals and toxins. Not
specified
Complementary/Ethical:
Emphasis on the environment, ethical treatment of animals and relationships with
local people. Mainly European-British Columbians
Nutritionism: From Food to Nutrients
You probably noticed in the Warm Up to this module that Health Canada’s Food
Guide has become more and more complex over the years. This aligns with our shifting
thoughts about food. While in the earlier decades of the 20th century we thought of
meals as made up of different types of foods—vegetables, meat, dairy products, etc.—
in recent decades, we tend to think of meals as made up of different nutritional
components—calories, fat, vitamins, etc. Most recently, we have gotten even more
complex, talking about things like antioxidants, trans fats, and phytochemicals.
Some food activists, such as food journalist Michael Pollan, argue that this shift in food
discourse has actually been harmful to our health. While we now know more about the
components of our food, much of this information is confusing, he claims (Pollan, 2008).
Also, it takes quite a bit of education and effort to understand and calculate the nutrients
in all of the foods we want to eat or avoid. This type of critique has led to the use of the
term nutritionism.
“a conceptualization of food that reduces the value and benefits of food to its nutrient
profile, thereby distancing eaters from the places and contexts in which food is
produced” (Koc et al 2017., p. 389). This term is usually used by critics of this paradigm.
This flow chart breaks “diet” into three parts: “fats,” “proteins,” and “carbohydrates."
These are then broken down into nutrients. The nutrients ultimately affect brain
metabolism and tissue metabolism.
1. The abundant information we now have about the components of food is confusing, hard to
remember or cumbersome to put into practice. For example, when eating or shopping,
people sometimes don’t want or aren’t able to remember things like how many calories they
are supposed to consume of which foods, which kinds of fat are healthy, or whether
phytochemicals are good or bad for health.
2. Food has many other functions in society than promoting health, as we talked about in
Module 1. Eating, shopping and growing food can be pleasurable and satisfying. It can be a
building block of friendship, family, community and identity. Thinking about food only in terms
of its nutrients can be stressful and taxing. In fact, it can take the fun and joy out of eating!
You might think food deserts are only located in out-of-the-way rural and remote areas,
where there are few stores of any kind, let alone grocery stores; and this is sometimes
the case. But food deserts are also located in large cities like Toronto. More recently,
the term food swamp has also been used in analyzing food access (Lenardson et al,
2015). These analyses focus on health and neigbourhood characteristics in areas with a
high density of fast food and convenience stores relative to healthy food options.
In fact, the Ontario-based, non-profit food justice organization Sustain Ontario put
together a Map of Food Deserts in Toronto (click on the map to enlarge). What do you
notice about the relationship between income and the location of fast food stores and
grocery stores? Take a look, for example, at the dark red (very low income) section near
Jane and Finch. How many grocery stores versus fast food outlets are there? Now take
a look at the dark green sections (very high incomes). How many grocery stores versus
fast food outlets are there?
This map should help you see that food deserts are often located in low-income
communities. (Don’t be confused by some of the green areas with few grocery stores.
Remember that vehicle and public transportation access is important in defining food
deserts. Residents of wealthier neighbourhoods typically own cars, meaning they can
easily go much farther to get to a grocery store). Food access is affected by a host of
factors—including income, mobility, transportation, walkability—that create a “layering of
disadvantages.” It’s also important to note that low-income communities are typically
home to large numbers of residents of colour, and that First Nations reserves are often
food deserts. So, the concept of food deserts provides evidence of income andrace
inequality in food access.
Ethno-racial background
People not only identify with others of the same age but they also identify as members
of a particular race or ethno-cultural background. This can also have an influence on the
healthfulness of their diets.
Let’s watch the video below about African-Canadian and African-American culture.
As you may have noted, some of the interviewees in the film talked about an African-
American identification with “soul food.” They saw eating soul food as a part of being
“black” or a way of connecting to African-American history with positive mental health
outcomes. However, some interviewees were concerned about potential negative health
effects of soul food, which is often high in salt, sugar, and fat. Still others pointed out
that the real problem for health is not soul food (which can have healthy versions) but,
rather, the fact that African-Americans tend to live in food deserts. So there is some
debate about this. But the point here is that ethno-racial identity may influence dietary
health.
Ideas about a healthy body type also vary by cultural background. In a Canadian study
by Ristovski-Slijepcevic et al. (2010), one African-Canadian woman suggested that
extreme thinness was not an ideal in African-Canadian culture. She said, “[It's not ideal
if] you can’t tell the front from the back, [if] you know what I mean. You got to have a
little bit of leg or ‘sumpin sumpin’…Not too many black women are small: we all have
big boobs and big behinds” (p. 323).
In fact, many black women from this study suggested that being too thin was
unhealthy. The implication is that food habits and body shapes that are portrayed as
unhealthy from some ethno-racial perspectives might not be seen as unhealthy from
other ethno-racial perspectives.
Topics
How our food habits shape and are shaped by culture
Influences of capitalist consumer culture and alternative culture on food and
shopping habits
Ways in which unconscious cultural constructs shape food habits
Learning Objectives
By the end of this module, you should be able to:
Describe processes through which food behaviour influences culture and culture
influences food behaviour.
Use sociological terms such as taboo, fetish, and cultural schemas to explain
food habits and possibilities for food system change.
Relate your own food shopping and eating habits to capitalist or alternative
values.
There are important material constraints on how we choose food, such as our food budget. If we
have a low income, there is sometimes little we can consider beyond cost. However, cost
constraints are typically fairly obvious to us. This week, we’re going to talk about a sometimes
less-obvious influence on our food choices: culture.
Food and Culture: Introduction
When we think of food and culture, we often think of ethno-cultural background. For
example, we might assume (perhaps erroneously) that Canadians from a Chinese
background are good at using chopsticks or that someone who grew up in a South
Asian household likes spicy food.
Our discussion of food and culture this week goes beyond these simple associations
and cultural stereotypes. We explore the influence of the larger culture of capitalism on
all of our food habits. We also look not only at how culture shapes us but how we
shape it.
What is Culture?
Culture refers to things like knowledge, language, values, customs, and material
objects that circulate in a group or society. Culture is consciously passed on from one
generation to the next through parenting and education. It is
also unconsciously absorbed and reproduced through things like everyday practices,
conversations, actions, popular culture, and the media.
How does culture influence food shopping?
When you think of culture, you might think of someone’s ethnicity or background. This
can have a definitive influence of food choices. But as you read in the Johnston and
Cappeliez chapter for today, a less obvious and often-unconscious influence on all of us
is capitalist consumer culture.
As members of a capitalist society, we have certain expectations about the shopping
experience. This is sometimes more obvious if our expectations are not met.
Imagine the following:
Culture Shapes Us
How does culture “work”? How do ideas and norms affect our behaviour?
In the reading for this week, Johnston and Cappeliez describe their interviews with a
group of Torontonians who shop at Whole Foods Market in Yorkville and another group
who shop at Karma Co-op in the Annex. They compare these two groups because
shopping at either place is a very different experience.
Cultural schemas are “unconscious networks of neural associations” that shape our
habits, including our food habits. They are internalized through everyday experience in
our culture and are activated in certain situations to motivate our behaviour (Vaisey,
2009, p.1686).
In a capitalist consumer culture like ours, one of the cultural schemas that we might internalize is
that our needs and desires can be fulfilled through the purchase of commodities. An idea
expressed throughout our culture, especially in advertising, is that “the good life” revolves
around buying particular things. In this sense, foods can be “co-modified” valued more for the
values they represent, than the actual properties of the foods themselves.
We also internalize cultural schemas around shopping—such as the notion that shopping and
products should be convenient, predictable, consistent, cost-effective, and should involve
choice/variety.
As a profit-driven grocery store, albeit one focused on healthy foods, Whole Foods draws on
many of these cultural schemas to promote itself. Can you think of examples from the video?
(Go back to your video notes, if necessary). By promoting itself using these common cultural
schemas, Whole Foods also reinforces the idea that the principles of convenience, predictability,
consistency, cost-effectiveness, and variety are important. This, in turn, reinforces these
principles in our neural networks.
Karma Co-op differs from Whole Foods in many ways because it is a non-profit co-op with an
environmental, social, and health mission. In the video, we can see that Karma both draws on
and challenges some of the cultural schemas we are talking about. What are some examples from
the video? How does Karma promote itself (1) according to one or more of the values of
convenience, predictability, consistency, cost-effectiveness, and variety and (2) as an
organization that challenges one or more of these values?
Our examination of these two stores shows that dominant cultural schemas in capitalist consumer
culture are reinforced in some places (e.g., conventional for-profit stores as well as alternative
organizations) and challenged in others (e.g., alternative food organizations. like co-ops). Since
most people shop at conventional stores, they are most often exposed to cultural schemas that
promote convenience, predictability, consistency, cost-effectiveness, and variety. Thus, most
people come to internalize these capitalist consumer values as desirable and good. This is one
way in which culture influences us.
All this being said, we are not robots that automatically do what is the norm in our culture. We
have agency to make decisions, even decisions that go against mainstream culture. On the next
page, we’ll look at this issue and how we influence culture.
We Shape Culture I
There are many pleasurable and beneficial aspects to capitalist consumer culture. This
is one reason most of us agree to live in such a culture and adhere to the values of
convenience, predictability, consistency, cost-effectiveness, and variety. Having variety
in food, for example, allows us to experience the sensual pleasures of different tastes,
smells, and textures. If our favourite grocery store has a predictable list of products, we
can count on buying those products whenever we want or need them. If a store has
convenient hours, we can go shopping whenever it suits our schedule. The list goes on.
On the other hand, environmental and social justice activists say that capitalist consumer values
promotes environmental damage, social injustice, and human health problems. Consider the
value of variety: if people expect grocery stores to carry all types of products regardless of the
season, a significant amount of global imports is required because such variety can’t be grown or
produced locally. As you probably know, global imports, in turn, can contribute to climate
change because of long-distance transport. Global imports can also undermine the livelihoods of
local farmers, which is a social justice issue. If stores buy imported apples instead of local
varieties (which often happens if imported varieties are cheaper), then local farmers suffer
financially.
Some people recognize the environmental, social, and heath problems associated with capitalist
consumer culture and try to resist or even change this culture. One group of people doing this
have been labelled “alternative hedonists.” Examining this group and the notion of alternative
hedonism gives us a sense of how we shape culture. We will do this on the next page.
We Shape Culture II
Alternative hedonism
In Chapter 3, Johnston and Cappeliez discuss the idea of alternative hedonism, a term
coined by British philosopher Kate Soper. They also define and explain it. This is an
important definition for this module. Did you take note of it while reading? Do you
remember what it means?
What is “alternative hedonism”?
“The idea that alternative forms of consumption (e.g. buying local, biking instead of
driving, reusing items instead of buying new ones, etc.) are motivated not only by
altruistic concerns and a desire for ‘a better world’ – they can be motivated also by
the self-interested pleasuresof consuming differently” (Koç et al. 2012, p.380, emphasis
added).>
Soper calls people who find pleasure in alternative ways of consuming—a fairly small
subgroup of the population in our society—alternative hedonists.
To reiterate, alternative consumption (including "ethical eating") can feel good to people
both because they feel they are improving the world AND because alternative
consumption can be pleasurable in itself. The word hedonism refers to pleasure, which
means that “alternative hedonists” enjoy different kinds of pleasure than are typically
emphasized in consumer culture.
How?
Soper gives the example of someone who bikes to school or work instead of driving.
They might feel good about the fact that they are not contributing to greenhouse gas
emissions. Yet, they might also enjoy the act of biking itself. Since capitalist
consumerism has negative consequences, such as traffic jams on ugly highways, biking
can feel like a pleasurable escape. Bikers might also enjoy parts of the experience like
feeling the wind in their hair, hearing the birds sing, or becoming invigorated through
outdoor physical exercise.
Figure 3.2: An alternative hedonist may enjoy cycling not only for its
environmental benefits but because cycling itself is pleasurable.
Source: Wikimedia Commons, City of Toronto, 2010(Opens image)
Can you think of some other examples of the pleasures of alternative consumption
specifically around food habits? (Can you think of why practices such as buying local,
shopping at alternative venues such as farmers’ markets and food co-ops, or cooking
from scratch might be pleasurable? Or can you think of how shopping at mainstream
grocery stores might be unpleasurable, making people want to avoid it?) We will come
back to these ideas in the Shopping Field Trip activity at the end of this module.
To add to your own ideas, we can think about some examples from Chapter 3 of the
textbook. Some Karma Co-op shoppers Johnston and Cappeliez interviewed might be
considered alternative hedonists because they felt alternative pleasures around food
shopping that revolved around social connections (e.g., feeling “at home” in a
community of like-minded people or seeing “smiling faces”), not the typical pleasures of
capitalist consumer culture.
In Harris’s theory of cultural materialism, social and cultural life arises from people
finding practical solutions to their daily problems. In other words, culture has a utilitarian
basis (Harris, 1979).
Food Taboos: Sustainable Urban Food Production
A recent proposal by McGill University PhD student Jakub Dzamba shows that food
taboos can have implications on food system change.
Dzamba designed a system for cricket farming, which he proposes can help feed food-
insecure families (i.e., families who don’t have enough to eat). He promotes his system
as a very efficient way of producing nutritious, high-protein food in urban centres.
De-fetishization
Although the fetishization of food products iscommon in capitalism, alternative food
organizations and projects have begun to de-fetishize food products. Farmers’ markets
and food certified by the international Fair Trade organization are two examples of this.
If people see the farmer face-to-face at a market or see a Fair Trade label, they are
more likely to think about the labour behind the products they are buying. They might
then want to take action against social injustice in the food system, whether in a small
way—like continuing to shop at alternative venues and buy fair trade products—or in a
larger way—like campaigning for migrant workers' rights. For this reason, some food
activists believe that de-fetishization is part of food system transformation.
MODULE 4
Topics
The social construction of gender
Gender roles in food provision
Gender and food choices
Learning Objectives
By the end of this module, you should be able to:
What is “Foodwork”?
In Chapter 6 of the textbook, Brady, et al. discuss the gender divide in foodwork. Your
textbook glossary defines foodwork as follows:
Foodwork: “The efforts involved in food production, procurement, preparation, service,
and clean-up. It may be paid (as employment) or unpaid (in the household)” (Koç et al.
(2017) p. 386).
In this session, we're going to focus on unpaid domestic (household) foodwork.
Let's think about household foodwork for a moment. Since it has historically been the
domain of women in most cultures, in the private space of the home, it tends to receive
only limited attention. Many of the activities involved have also become somewhat
invisible to us, since we don't think of them as “important.” However, feminists have
shown that the activities involved in feeding a household are varied and complex—
worthy of the term “work.”
Foodwork Activities
Feminist food scholars and, most famously, American sociologist Marjorie DeVault (1991), have
documented the different types of activities involved in foodwork.
They include:
Planning meals
Travelling to food stores
Selecting and purchasing products
Growing food
Preparing raw ingredients
Cooking/baking
Cleaning up
Disposing of waste
You might be able to think of more.
How does your list from the previous page compare?
DeVault and others also point out that, while foodwork can be satisfying and pleasurable, it is
also complex and draining. This is because the activities involved are not only physical (e.g.,
walking around a grocery store or chopping vegetables). They are also mental (e.g., making sure
to buy enough food and the right ingredients to make meals for the entire week)
and emotional (e.g., deciding how to negotiate the different food preferences, allergies,
nutritional needs, etc. of different family members). Some feminist scholars also consider
teaching table manners to children and facilitating dinner-table conversations, as types of
foodwork.
Foodwork includes activities that are:
Physical
Mental
Emotional
For all of these reasons, foodwork is of interest to scholars studying gender and the gendered
division of household labour. Before we get into the “meat and potatoes” of gender and food, we
will get into some definitions.
What is “Gender”?
In our culture, many people think of gender as a biological or genetic fact. If someone
has XX chromosomes and female sex organs, they will act like a girl or a woman. If
someone has XY chromosome and male sex organs, they will act like a boy or man.
However, we also know from living in the world that some biological “men” act in
traditionally “feminine” ways and some biological “women" act in traditionally
“masculine” ways. Transgender children have also frequently been made to live
as either a “boy” or a “girl,” even though they have biological or genetic characteristics
of both sexes. Clearly, biology is not the only factor at work.
Feminist scholars have noted that women and men (or transgender individuals who live
as one or the other) have different opportunities in the world because of social
institutions (e.g., the workforce or the family) and the patterns within these institutions.
For example, women may be better cooks than men not because they have a biological
affinity for it, but because they typically have more opportunities to learn how to cook. In
many families, girls have been expected to do more “indoor” work and boys to do more
“outdoor” work. If a woman chooses to work at her job fewer hours than her male
partner because she is expected to do more childcare, she, again, may have more
opportunities to spend time in the kitchen than a man.
The role of socialization in creating gender has also been emphasized. Children are
taught when they are young to act in gender-appropriate ways (ways that a particular
culture sees as “feminine” or “masculine”) by their parents, teachers, the media, and
other influences.
More recently, a fourth way of understanding gender has become common in sociology.
The theory is often referred to as “doing gender” (or what Brady et al. refer to in
Chapter 6 of the textbook as “gender construction”). In an influential article published
in 1987, sociologists Candice West and Don Zimmerman observed that people don't
stop developing a gender identity in childhood, as the socialization theory suggests.
Rather, they “act” or “perform” gender throughout their lives. When people don't act in
gender-appropriate ways, West and Zimmerman argue, they suffer social and material
penalties.
The “doing gender” theory is often the most difficult for people to understand. So, let's
think about this for a second. If you were suddenly to start acting like a different gender,
what would happen? What social, physical, and material penalties might result?
List some examples of penalties for not "doing gender" properly.
Social penalties: teasing, dirty looks, bullying, ostracism
Physical penalties: spanking by parents, violence (e.g., anti-gay hate crimes, which
have been on the rise in recent years)
Material penalties: discrimination in employment
Defining Gender
In this course, we will take a holistic view of gender, keeping in mind that gender is
constructed at different levels of society and in multiple ways.
Barbara Risman's view of gender as operating at different domains or levels of society
is useful here.
For Risman, gender operates at:
The individual level of identity, which is influenced by socialization.
The interactional level, where individuals "do" gender in response to cultural
expectations.
The institutional level, where organizational practices (e.g., in the family, employment,
etc.) create a gendered distribution of resources and opportunities.
(Risman, 2004, pp.433, 437)
It is important to note that these gender domains are continually influencing each other
(see Figure 4.1 below).
Canadian Statistics
Let’s look at the Canadian context.
Chart 4.1: Cooking and Cleanup Time, Canada (in hours per week) from 1998–
2010
Source: Adapted from Statistics Canada. (1998, 2006, 2011). Overview of the time
use of Canadians. Ottawa: Minister of Industry.
We see a similar trend to what we saw in the U.S. data, with women doing less cooking
and cleaning up over time, but only slightly since 1998. The time men spend cooking
and cleaning up has mostly stagnated since the late 90s, with no change between 1998
and 2005 and only a three-minute increase per day from 2005 to 2010.
Another thing to notice is the difference between men and women’s time. Women still
spend about twice as much time cooking and cleaning up (6.4 hours/week) as men (3.2
hours/week) in Canada.
In other words, we have to be very careful about conflating what we see on the Food
Network with what’s happening in real households.
Another important point is that these statistics are about the general population. The
statistics are quite different if we look at co-habiting men and women.
Is the gender gap greater between married men and women or greater between single men
and women? What do you predict? Again, we don’t have Canadian data on this, but we can
assume some similarities with the U.S. data.
Was your prediction correct? The gap is bigger between married men and women than
between single men and women. Women tend to cook more after marriage while men
tend to cook less.
One thing to take away from this chart is that gender roles typically become more
exaggerated after marriage. This is a pattern that researchers have found for domestic
work in general (Fox, 2009). We have said that women generally do about twice as
much cooking as men. But, from the chart, you can see that married women cook about
4.5 times as much as married men. This pattern has also been observed in a recent
analysis of US data of who is making the grocery shopping trips for households (Taylor,
Ralph and Smart, 2015). In this analysis of couples with similar time commitments to
employment outside the home, women made almost twice as many of the grocery
shopping trips as did their male partner.
1. Relative resources
2. Time constraints
3. Gender ideology
4. Gender construction
Make sure you have a good understanding of this part of the readings.
Here, we're going to focus on the “time constraints” and “gender construction” theories.
What did you find? What different versions of femininity and womanhood are
portrayed and how is each tied to food? What does this say about discourses of
femininity?
We could say there are two versions of femininity related to food and foodwork in this clip: (1)
Miranda, a modern woman with a career who likes large mugs of coffee—not dainty cups of tea—
and is horrified by the idea of baking pies from scratch, and (2) Magda, a more traditional woman
who values nutrition (she says “tea is better for you”) and making pies from scratch.
The point is that there are strong discourses in our culture that associate women with cooking/baking
and dainty, healthy foods. However, other discourses that challenge those traditional associations do
exist on the margins (like Miranda's character on Sex and the City).
What does this mean? For McPhail, et al., this way of thinking lines up with more
general attitudes in our society about gendered behaviours and gender inequality. We
tend to believe that people do things according to individual choice even though, in
reality, our behaviour is shaped by larger social structures (e.g., gender). Denying the
influence of larger social structures means that we can deny or
ignore systemic issues (issues based on our social system, rather than on individual
issues or opinions). In other words, people tend to think that sexism is the result of a
few sexist individuals rather than a larger social pattern. If we want to combat issues like
gender inequality, we need to recognize the social structures and systemic issues that
support it. We discuss this further in the next section.
If women are expected to eat “healthy,” dainty foods and small portions (and pay
attention to their weight), this can contribute to a culture where women are
undernourished or develop eating disorders. (Susan Bordo [1993] has done great
work on this subject. If you're interested in reading more, check out her
book, Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture and the Body, especially
the chapter called “Hunger as Ideology.”)
Studies of college-age students across a range of gender identities found
transgender women to be particularly vulnerable to pressures to conform to
specific eating and body image norms as evidenced by extraordinarily high rates
of eating disorders in this group (Gordon et al, 2016).
If men are expected to eat meat, avoid healthy foods, and eat larger portions,
they may find it difficult to resist gender norms and chose foods they actually like
or that represent their political convictions through eating patterns such as
vegetarianism (Sumpter, 2015).
Studies have also shown that this association among meat, unhealthy foods, and
“masculinity” can be detrimental to men's health (Mroz et al., 2011) and make it
more challenging to adopt healthy food practices.
If eating “healthy,” dainty foods and small portions is encouraged as a feminine
ideal (and paying attention to body weight), this may also contribute to fat
discrimination and “body moralizing.” This is something that Brady, et al.
discuss in Chapter 6 of the textbook. We will also discuss this more in Module 6.
Simple Highlight
What do you think about these issues? Let's finish the module with a debate. Turn to the
next page for instructions.