(Food) Hoarding

Abstract

Food hoarding in human behaviour, on its own, has not been frequently documented or extensively researched within archival studies. Various reasons may contribute to a lack of available information on food hoarding. A primary example is that hoarders often experience feelings of guilt, shame, and dispossession of their hoardings. Accessible materials in food hoarding research, however, do include historically archived propaganda posters from world wars and news articles that described the scarcity mindset of citizens during times of crisis, including wars, genocides, and pandemics. Clinical and sociological research has often provided a general analysis of hoarding that informs researchers of the issues that hoarders deal with in private. However, I propose that research on general hoarding should extend to observing behaviours around food and its interconnection to memory and trauma. Furthermore, I believe that the literature about theories of hoarding as an act of archiving—although there are very few—adds to the perceptions of displaced communities’ experiences with food insecurity and attachment. These new methods of examining the archive explain how the displaced have preserved their pasts, challenged their present through mobility (or lack thereof), and planned for their futures through knowledge beyond a traditional archive.