Food Activism: Agency, Democracy and Economy

About the AuthorCarole Counihan is Professor Emerita of Anthropology at Millersville University, USA.Valeria Siniscalchi is Professor of Anthropology at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Marseille, France.Product DescriptionAcross the globe, people are challenging the agro-industrial food system and its exploitation of people and resources, reduction of local food varieties, and negative health consequences. In this collection leading international anthropologists explore food activism across the globe to show how people speak to, negotiate, or cope with power through food. Who are the actors of food activism and what forms of agency do they enact? What kinds of economy, exchanges, and market relations do they practice and promote? How are they organized and what are their scales of political action and power relations? Each chapter explores why and how people choose food as a means of forging social and economic justice, covering diverse forms of food activism from individual acts by consumers or producers to organized social groups or movements. The case studies embrace a wide geographical spectrum including Cuba, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Mexico, Italy, Canada, France, Colombia, Japan, and the USA. This is the first book to examine food activism in diverse local, national, and transnational settings, making it essential reading for students and scholars in anthropology and other fields interested in food, economy, politics and social change.Review"Carole Counihan and Valeria Siniscalichi's Food Activism: Agency, Democracy, and Economy presents itself as a valuable and timely offering. This edited volume makes two particularly important contributions. First, it convincingly argues that food is a critical nodal point through which activist subjectivities are materialized and around which activist practices are mobilized. Secondly, it emphasizes that the ethnographic approach is especially well-suited to illuminate the diverse and nuanced ways in which contemporary global forces are negotiated, appropriated, and challenged by agents in practices of everyday life." --Brad Jones, Digest: a Journal of Foodways and Culture"The editors achieved each of [their] goals by effectively weaving a holistic examination of food activism across the world. The case studies they have assembled individually suggest both diversity and uniformity within food activist movements across geographic, economic, political, and cultural boundaries ... Food Activism's chapters are easily readable for anyone with a basic understanding of food system theory and a solid social science background. A number of readers will find Food Activism useful. Students will find the work clearly written, with minimal use of jargon, as well as excellent material for in-class discussions and research projects. Food system scholars will find the nuance between the profiled movements intriguing, as it challenges notions of agency and control within food movements. Activists and food policy experts will find inspiration for their own initiatives and policies from the cases presented." -John C. Jones, Graduate Studies Journal of Food Studies