You Are What You Eat: The Social Economy of the Slow Food Movement

Abstract

Recent work by Schor revives concerns raised by Veblen and Hirsch over the destructive consequences of competitive consumption. In contrast, Twitchell argues that increased access to commodities as symbols of luxury signals a democratization of class and social status. Rather than playing the role of dupes, consumers are active co-conspirators in the creation and maintenance of luxury goods markets. While flawed, each of these perspectives has something important to offer to social economists interested in understanding consumption. A key question for social economists is whether material pleasure and the symbolic expression of identity through consumer goods is compatible with a more politicized, socially conscious consumption ethos. Food consumption offers a fruitful starting point for pursuing this issue. I begin by examining food and its symbolic role in identity formation. I then consider the Slow Food movement and explore the ways in which it maintains a central role for material pleasure while promoting a socially and environmentally conscious stance toward consumption.consumer identity, cultural capital, food consumption, social capital, slow food,

The morality of cheese: A paradox of defensive localism in a transnational cultural economy

“…"Slow, then involves notions of unadulterated, locally based products, cooked in conventional ways and enjoyed at a leisurely pace in which social relations can be developed and reproduced. Read descriptions of this 'slowness' closely and it is not difficult to discern the patriarchal lens through which it is conceived, yet there are few gender-based critiques of the Slow Food movement (but see Bock 2004). social relations that underpin production and livelihoods in rural areas (Leitch 2000, Labelle 2004, Pietrykowski 2004). …”

“…The Ark of Taste was envisioned as "a way to catalogue animal breeds, cheeses, meats, fruits, grains, and herbs threatened with extinction due to consumer substitution with lower priced, standardized products." and is designed as a vehicle through which threatened production systems and products can be protected and extended (Pietrykowski 2004;315).…”

Agricultura Urbana e Infraestrutura Sustentável: A situação no Brasil e em Portugal

“…Este tipo de agricultura urbana tem sido principalmente um subproduto da industrialização das áreas metropolitanas de Lisboa desde os anos 60, envolvendo populações tipicamente imigrantes de origens diferentes com fundo rural. Não foi só até a administração municipal eleita de 2007 que a agricultura urbana foi colocada na agenda política, aproveitando o ímpeto dos movimentos sociais globais, nomeadamente para melhorar a segurança alimentar, a segurança alimentar ou o movimento "slowfood", por exemplo (PIETRYKOWSKI, 2004). Em Portugal, desde 1999, cada Plano Diretor Municipal tem de circunscrever a Estrutura Ecológica Urbana para Lisboa.…”

FORMakademisk 8-1 2015 THE WHOLE ISSUE

“…Pertinent to the Global Studio, De Wever et al (2010, p, 355) argue peer tutoring can also be seen to occur in an online environment where it improves students' "knowledge construction". Specifically pertinent to both Global Studio projects to be outlined here, cross-institutional educational endeavours conducted through ICT have been argued to precipitate increased levels of peer learning among students (OECD-CERI, 2005). Elsewhere, we have suggested that peer tutoring is a feature of the Global Studio (Bohemia and Ghassan, 2012;Ghassan and Bohemia, 2011).…”