Home is Where the Food is

Lauren Wun-Hym

In today’s society you can walk through the food precinct in town and find a wide range of cultural foods and cuisines, all easily accessible to everyone, whether you are apart of the culture or not. Kuttainen (2015) notes that taste is not only culturally constructed, but also an expression of our identity, that is to say that through our personal cultural experiences with food, we are able to construct a self identity, and also allows us to create or reinforce a community identity. Food allows people to experience different cultures and to relish our own cultures, whether we are living in our traditional homeland or not. 

Atkins & Bowler (2001, pp. 273) acknowledge this sense of identity that is gained through food, stating, “one factor in the origin and persistence of foodways is that they often represent an important expression of our identity, both as individuals and in reference to a broader ethnic, class or religious grouping.” Food enables ethnic groups to express their identity, and come together as a community, allowing them to connect and understand others and their cultures. So, when walking through the food district in town, people are able to share a collective sense of community identity and belonging, people as strangers coming together through a common love of food. 

Image from: http://www.lumosforbusiness.com/

Yet it is not necessary for people to go out to restaurants to experience a taste of different cuisines from different cultures. Tumblr has many blogs dedicated to specific cultures, or to a multitude of different cultures, providing recipes, historic information regarding specific dishes, traditional ingredients and traditional uses for different dishes. Each day the Internet allows us to create a sense of identity more and more, providing access to worlds and cultures we thought were out of our reach. Our community and self identity is deeply ingrained in the food we eat, whether it be trying a new foreign cuisine or a dish your mother used to cook on special occasions, food is an much a part of our identity as our own name. 

References:

Atkins, P. & Bowler, I. (2001). Food in society: Economy, culture, geography. New York, United Sates of America: Oxford University Press Inc.

Foodways. (2014). In Wikipedia. Retrieved September 17^th, 2015, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foodways.

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives, and the making of place, Lecture 8: Food networks. [PowerPoint Slides]. Retrieved from: http://www.jculearn.edu.au.

Image reference:

Lumosforbusiness. (n.d.). The way we eat. [Image]. Retrieved from: http://www.lumosforbusiness.com/uploads/images/image/23/the_way_we_eat.jpeg

Eating Vicariously Through Facebook

By Marina Douglas

It’s lunchtime. You’re sitting down to a home-made sandwich and scrolling leisurely through Facebook when you see it: one of your friends has gone out to eat and consequently shared a picture of their delicious meal. It might be a huge burger, resplendent with accompanying chips. It might be a sundae that’s dripping with chocolate, and you feel your mouth start to water as you realise that there’s actual brownie under all that ice cream. Whatever it is, your poor little sandwich suddenly seems meagre by comparison – a pitiful creation that can’t live up to the glory of what everyone else is eating. But you eat it anyway. And you keep scrolling.

Food plays a huge role in shaping self and community identity on Facebook. Every day we are exposed to images of food in ads, pages, shared posts, and the alarmingly frequent updates from those friends who secretly think themselves connoisseurs. Atkins and Bowler (2001) touch on this, stating that there is a “socially-derived desire for our consumption habits to show us in the best possible light.” (p. 272). Indeed, food has the power to change opinions about a person’s class – everything from the location of the meal to the accompanying comments has an impact. It’s an expression of our identity, and can be a source of shame or pride (Kuttainen, 2015).

Image from: cdn.images.express.co.uk Photographing food

The presence of ads in media only drives us further to present a desirable image, according to what the ad suggests. How is your self-identity going to hold up with all these blatant social cues around? In his analysis of the world’s current food problem, Patel (2007) points out that we have more food than ever before yet there is both famine and obesity. As social beings, we feel a need to avoid identifying with either of these things and this also impacts on our choices of what to eat and who needs to know about it. This is where Facebook comes in. Because at the end of the day, no matter what you eat, there’s something immensely and unsettlingly satisfying about letting people know about it, with that unsaid declaration of “This is my food and my life. Look at it. Envy me. Love me.”

References

Atkins, P., & Bowler, I. (2001). The origins of taste. In Food in society: Economy, culture, geography (pp. 272-295). New York, NY: Oxford University Press Inc.

Freeman, B. (2014, October 17). Digital junk: Food and beverage marketing on Facebook. The Conversation. Retrieved from http://theconversation.com/digital-junk-food-and-beverage-marketing-on-facebook-32609

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives, and the making of place, lecture 8: Food networks. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au

Patel, R. (2007). Stuffed and starved: Markets, power and the hidden battle for the world food system. Melbourne, Australia: Black Inc.

Image Credits

Gavin, A. (2014). Photographing food [Image]. Retrieved from http://cdn.images.express.co.uk/img/dynamic/1/590x/photographing-food-share-503694.jpg

The Blanket Over Food Networks

By Stephanie Reid

In a world where the obese outnumber the 800 million that are hungry in the world (Patel, 2007), we are facing a new world. Those that eat too much are quickly growing in number, even though the numbers of those that do not eat enough are not depleting. The food of the world is going to those that already have enough, but it is not being shared with those that do not have any.

The food networks have a very long, dark history with slave trading (Kuttainen, 2015). This narrative behind the food that we eat is never spoken of, even though most adults definitely know of the history of slave trading. While these people were enslaved in the food industry, they were fed little to nothing and received almost nothing for their work. Food and trade companies feed us the narrative that they want us to see, and therefore we would be buying their products. 

They communicate through the means of their networks, so that way we don't have to see a thing (as their consumers). Clothing companies do the same thing. 

Site

Often, we see this occurring through Facebook, where, as phrased by Patel (2007) that ‘guided by profit motive, the corporations that sell our food shape and constrain how we eat, and how we think about food’. However, instead of hiding the slave trade narrative, Facebook shows us advertisements that we ‘want’ to see in order for them to gain a profit as free social networking platform.  

Facebook, as guided by profit motive, sells us a story that we ‘want’ to see in order to keep the profits rolling in; as do food companies, by putting a blanket over the slave trading that we pretend not to see.

References: 

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, Narratives, and the Making of Place, Week 8: Networked Narratives: Food. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/

Patel, R. (2007). Stuffed & starved. Black Inc.

Eyewitnesstohistory.com,. (2007). Slave Trade: the African Connection, ca 1788. Retrieved 17 September 2015, from http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/slavetrade.htm

Panerai, A. (2014). Obesity Vs. Malnutrition: a thorny paradox. Echeion. Retrieved 17 September 2015, from http://www.echeion.it/hot-news/obesity-vs-malnutrition-a-thorny-paradox/

Food For Thought

By Aydan Johnstone

The central focus for the lecture and reading material this week was on food, and more specifically on power distribution throughout the food network. The introduction of the lecture discussed how food is defined through culture and power. Kuttainen (2015) stated that "food is a mirror of culture" which was a unanimous view across the assigned readings. 'Food in Society' (Atkins & Bowler, 2001) illustrated the connection of food with culture which was thoroughly discussed in the lecture: “tastes are also derived from our culturally constructed inclinations for particular dishes and ingredients”. However, the reading that was most interesting to myself was the Patel (2007) reading 'Stuffed and Starved'. This text was quite casual in tone but was extremely powerful in demonstrating a particular key concept of our subject: Power. Patel (2007) emphasized the power that large corporations exercise to control a consumer’s choice of food. 

Facebook is a virtual network that I am connected with and is ranked among the top three hundred corporations in the world. Facebook is an excellent example of how consumers are subject to mass corporate control through restriction of choice and freedom. The corporate giant reported a revenue of 12.47 billion USD in 2014, a 58% increase from its predeceasing year, and yet the social media platform is absolutely free to join. This begs the question of how Facebook generates revenue, and who is being exploited in this process. This info-graphic explains how Facebook makes money while remaining free, the answer to which is primarily through advertising.  The advertising that is prominent within the news feed of every Facebook user is a subtle form of communication and marketing power that we are being subjected to. Patel (2007) emphasized this point brilliantly in relation to food by stating that "guided by profit motive, the corporations that sell our food shape and constrain how we eat, and how we think about food". As the 2014 revenue report suggests, Facebook is indeed guided by profit motive, and is a corporation that uses advertising as a form of power and communication. This means that they ultimately decide what we as consumers are interested in and how we think about the products we consume. 

To conclude, Facebook is a dominant dictator of our consumer choices through subtle hints of communication and their pole position in power. Advertising highly influences our choices in product consumption.  

References

Atkins, P., & Bowler, I. (2001). Food in society: economy, culture, geography. Arnold, Hodder Headline Group.

Chen, L. (2015). The World’s Largest Companies 2015. Retrieved from: http://www.forbes.com/sites/liyanchen/2015/05/06/the-worlds-largest-companies/

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our Space: Networks, Narratives, and the Making of Place, Week 8: Networked Narratives: Food. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.jcu.edu.au/

Patel, R. (2007). Stuffed & starved. Black Inc.

Popper, B. (2015). Facebook Posts Strong Earnings and Tops $12 Billion in Annual Revenue. Retrieved from: http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/28/7931091/facebook-earnings-q4-fourth-quarter-2014

Ritholtz, B. (2014). How Does Facebook Make Its Money? Retrieved from: http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2014/02/how-does-facebook-make-its-money/

Image Reference

Quiles, L. (2015). Controversial Illustrations by Spanish Artist Mirror The Ugly Side Of Society. Retrieved from: http://www.idealistrevolution.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/9.jpg

identity

Blog 5

www.towerhamletsarts.org.uk

Social networks have helped identities develop worldwide. We can find meanings for certain cultures and gain further knowledge on cultural backgrounds. The good thing about social network is that people of different ethnic backgrounds can express their culture and ways of life via their personal pages and it allows others to understand their culture. Within the reading from week seven it stated “during the migration an identity develops and is based on the feeling of sharing a common origin. This feeling of belonging to a same group makes up a collective identity of ethnic nature in a sense given by Max Weber”. I found that very intriguing, only because when you think about it social networks have helped develop an understanding of different cultures creating a harmonic world, but however there are those few people whom criticize and are known for being racist towards other cultures. Within the abstract of the article on collective identity and social movement it states that sociologists have been trying to fill gaps in mobilization and political process and impacts on social movements. As well as that impacts ethnic groups make on society.  Over the years immigration has been a very controversial topic within society. At the moment there is a massive amount of groups within Australia that are highly against the thousands of refugees whom are welcomed here. The only reason people are against this is because it will interrupt the economies standing. It’s hard for people to find jobs and now it’ll be even harder. I bet you are wondering what has this got to do with social networks helping ethnic identities? Well due to the situation it can make people change their views on others and by posting inappropriate pictures or statuses regarding ethnic groups can and will make a massive impact on social media.

Polletta. F. collective identity and social movements. [E book]. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/2678623?seq=1#page_thumbnails_tab_contents

 

Emmanuel Ma Mung (unknown). Comparative European research in migration, diversity and identities. [Class reading]. Retrieved from http://jcu.edu.au 

Diaspora and Social Media

Diaspora and Social Media

By Jason O'Neill

Image from: www.TechTimes.com

The term diaspora literally means dispersal and was originally used to describe the dispersal of Jewish people that started in 722 B.C (Ma Mung, 2005). Since then diaspora has been used to describe the migration of people from their country of origin (central pole) to their host country (secondary pole).

As these people migrate from their country of origin they are put in an unfamiliar and foreign place, to make this space a place they construct their own diasporic identities. These are maintained through narrative, myth, community memorialising that map journeys from one place to another in history (Kuttainen, 2015). Usually the migrants form small social groups as they feel more familiar with one another. This social organisation is essentially based on communalism (Ma Mung, 2005) enabling the diaspora to distinguish itself from its host state.

As they have this desire to return back to their ancestral homeland they stay connected to the people residing in their homelands. These connections being the exchange of money, information and even individuals. Social media help maintain these connections by giving the migrants and their friends and family back in the country of origin a means of communication at just a push of a button. This allows for faster means of transaction of information such as picture and videos. This in turn helps maintain and construct new narratives and symbols of community identity for these people no matter the distance.

Referencing:

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002: Our space: networks, narratives and the making of place, Lecture 7: people networks. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

Ma Mung, E (2005). Disapora, spatiality, identities. Comparative Eurpoean research in migration, diversity and identities. (pp.33-48). Bilbao, Spain: University of Deusto

Image From:

McKalin, V. (2015). Islamic State kicked from Twitter: Found social haven at Diaspora? Retrieved from www.techtimes.com

The Evolution of Diasporic Networks

Blog Five

At first glance it seems as if social media is the exact opposite of a diasporic community, however upon closer inspection it is rather plain to see that there is in fact a lot in common between diasporic networks and social media. Kuttainen (quoting Edwards, 2008) explained what a diasporic networks, stating ‘groups of people who have been removed or displaced from their homelands due to territorial disputes, war, forced migration or immigration’. Along this line of reasoning it is difficult to see any kind of connection between this idea and social media however Ma Mung (2005) states that information passes through diasporic networks. The idea that social media is little more than a hub of communication and information is pervasive and prevalent. So, what more obvious proof could you possibly need at this point? Ma Mung (quoting Rigoni, 1997) states "Is it enough for migrants to develop and then maintain transnational associative networks to classify them as diasporas?"; as social media users hop from one popular site to the next to think of these people as diasporas themselves.

Well, perhaps looking at how social media sites work and interact with users could provide some interesting insight into the connections of diasporic communities and the ones that exist on social media. Building on the ideas presented in my previous blog regarding the construction of collective identity and information provided by Kuttainen (2015), it seems to me that new users to a site feel pressured (albeit unknowingly) to maintain the status quo of how interactions occur such as the use of certain speech patterns unique to the particular site, for example Twitter encourages the use of hashtags. The constant interaction and communication between users seems to be proof enough for me that the idea of diasporic networks is evolving.

References

Kuttainen, V. (2015). BA1002 Week Seven Lecture Slides. Retrieved from https://www.learnjcu.jcu.edu.au

Ma Mung, E. (2005). Diaspora, Spatiality, Identities. Comparative European Research in Migration, Diversity and Identities. University of Deusto: Bilbao

Image Reference

Social Media World Map. (2012). [Image] Retrieved from http://topnettools.com/6350/social-media-world-map/