Gender, Consumption and the Relocalisation of Food: A Research Agenda

Abstract

This article adopts a gendered approach to the study of alternative/local food consumption. Drawing on Allen and Sachs' three analytical domains, the article explores material, sociocultural and embodied conceptualisations of the relationship of women with alternative food consumption. Using original data collected from a study of food relocalisation in the UK, it argues that a gendered perspective that examines responsibilities for food preparation and for provisioning the household is important in understanding the motivation for and implications of decisions to consume local food. Local food consumption often involves consumers in choices over not only what they eat but how they cook, encouraging a move away from processed food and a greater emphasis on raw food and cooking from scratch. Such shifts have a disproportionate effect on women as they are still largely responsible for feeding the household. The article also explores ways in which social pressures around healthy eating and bodily fitness, particularly in relation to children's eating patterns, are increasingly relevant to local food consumption arguing. Again, such pressures fall unequally on different members of the household and are central to a gendered analysis of food consumption.

Alternative food networks and food provisioning as a gendered act

“…For example, in their examination of farm families during the U.S. farm crisis of the 1980s, Lobao and Meyer (1995) found that gender inequality persisted in the division of household labor despite women's increasing engagement in off-farm employment. Moving beyond examination of farm families, however, gender in the sphere of consumption has gone largely ignored by alternative agrifood scholars (Lockie and Kitto 2000;Allen and Sachs 2007;Little et al 2009). This reflects a larger critique of agrifood scholarship that the realm of production has been privileged over that of consumption (Lockie and Kitto 2000;Goodman and DuPuis 2002).…”

“…Allen and Sachs (2007) assert that in regards to food studies and gender, "we find a rich literature in body politics and gendered eating patterns, but substantive gaps in the areas of structural issues and social change" (p. 1). Exceptions include agrifood scholars who have shown that women, compared to men, are more likely to visit farmers' markets, participate in CSA programs or buy local, and those who have focused on 'foodies' (DeLind and Ferguson 1999;Little et al 2009;Cairns et al 2010). A few scholars have theorized that gender inequality could be reproduced in AFNs, in part due to the continued inequality in household labor in the U.S. (Allen and Sachs 2007;Little et al 2009;Deutsch 2011).…”

Reluctant pioneers in the European periphery? Environmental activism, food consumption and “growing your own”

“…More widely, this situation is mirrored in the absence of literature on ENGOs and FSP in and outside Czechia while there is an abundant literature on ENGOs and AFN-based campaigns (e.g. Nabhan 2002, Renting et al 2003, Selfa and Qazi 2005, Maxey 2006, Steel 2008, Little et al 2009). Activists' dismissive attitude towards FSP in Czechia during interviews aligns with the absence of articles on the topic in Sedmá generace, and activists explained this by bringing forward their concerns with the material uncontrollability of the use of harmful substances, gardeners' supposed lack of environmental consciousness and FSP's undesirable associations with Czechia's communist regime history.…”

“…Most of these activities relate to the effort to promote short food supply chains (SFSCs) and AFNs to reduce the environmental impact of food production and consumption, and bringing consumption and production together, a process often referred to as food relocalisation or re-embedding (e.g. Nabhan 2002, Renting et al 2003, Selfa and Qazi 2005, Maxey 2006, Steel 2008, Little et al 2009). In the Western social context, literature on FSP explores a range of questions, including the relative importance of economic versus other motivations for participating in FSP (Teitelbaum andBeckley 2006, Schupp andSharp 2012), the extent to which FSP can be considered a form of food localism (McEntee 2010, Schupp andSharp 2012), labour and gender constraints on people's involvement in FSP (McIntyre and Rondeau 2011), the contribution of FSP to local food security and as a source of nutritious food (Shaw 2006, Kortright andWakefield 2011) and the role of spatial planning in facilitating and shaping FSP practices (Adams et al 2013).…”

Les systèmes agroalimentaires alternatifs. Une revue de travaux anglophones en sciences sociales

“…10. Un article récent publié après la rédaction de cette revue (Little et al, 2009) souligne également le peu de recherches sur la relation entre S3A et genre. Il propose un agenda de recherche dans ce sens, insistant sur les relations entre les attentes en matière de souci du corps, qui pèsent davantage sur les femmes que sur les hommes, les pratiques culinaires et d'alimentation qui leur sont liées, et l'aspiration à la relocalisation de l'approvisionnement alimentaire.…”