'The rituals around food and the discourses of food help to construct the "borders, structures and hierarchic relations that constitute society itself", (Lincoln, 1986) this statement indicates that food can be recognised as an element of constructing society. Food can be seen as major importance in our lives and it is seen as an essential need for society to survive.
However many people have different attitudes to food and personal and cultural factors can be seen to affect what foods a person eats. A society of people may even share the same thoughts due to similar values and norms being shared in that society and these values may differ from a different group of people in another society.
Animals I personally consider edible are sheep, lamb, chicken, turkey, vegetables, pizza, chocolate but these are all personal favourites. Parts of an animal I don’t think I’ll be comfortable eating would be testicles, tongues, livers, and kidneys, although I have tried liver and kidney due to preference of the family but I wouldn’t want to eat it again. I am a great food lover and so I would be happy to try new foods ranging from zebra, horse to snails and various sea animals, however this would be subject to geographical movements where some foods are more available than others and so by travelling the world, we may be able to try all these foods. (For example, in France snail is a common food) With vegetables I am comfortable trying all types but I haven’t come across one so far of which I have really disliked.
Being a Muslim, with strong religious beliefs, in our culture it is forbidden to eat pig, therefore I have never tried it and never will. Some people may see this as strange, especially living in England, where bacon and pork are common foods of the west. But due to my religious differences I don’t associate with these foods. I personally don’t have a problem with people eating these foods next to me as I believe the pig is seen as a ‘swine’ and an unhealthy animal that is not clean; therefore it is seen as wrong to eat this. I respect other people’s views on their chosen foods and so they don’t bother me.
When it comes to sitting next to people who eat these foods I don’t mind personally as I am open to other peoples beliefs and respect their food choices. Working at Greggs means I have to serve people all types of food I can’t eat (due to it not being halal) and so I see it as my job and so it is my role to serve this food, so long as I am not forced to eat it, then I don’t have a problem with it.
As I have discussed, there are many reasons as to why people eat
certain foods and others do not. Due to religious reasons I don’t eat pig, or meat
which is not halal. Jewish people only eat kosher meat. Other people may not eat
meat at all due to being a vegetarian due to beliefs about animal cruelty or just
personal preference. British people have a close relation to keeping dogs as
pets and so they may be more inclined to not ever eat dogs.
Personal preference affects what food a person eats, yet cultural values can also be seen as another factor. Coming from a French culture you would eat snail, and in Britain this is rare. Different parts of the world have different foods associated with them and so whichever part of the world you live in you will have a different type of food preference as opposed to those in other parts of the world.
We can then relate this back to Lincoln and notice how an identity of a society is constructed by the foods they eat. Views of that society can be affected by the foods they eat and from this stereotypes emerge of that particular society. For example people from other countries may stereotype British people to drink afternoon tea with biscuits, this may be the case for the majority of British people, yet I’m sure there are more people like me who don’t drink tea yet this is due to personal preferences as opposed to British cultural values. The majority of foods people eat reflect their cultural and religious beliefs as their food is integrated with their way of life and gives a meaning of survival, and forms the societies we live in.
Personal preference affects what food a person eats, yet cultural values can also be seen as another factor. Coming from a French culture you would eat snail, and in Britain this is rare. Different parts of the world have different foods associated with them and so whichever part of the world you live in you will have a different type of food preference as opposed to those in other parts of the world.
We can then relate this back to Lincoln and notice how an identity of a society is constructed by the foods they eat. Views of that society can be affected by the foods they eat and from this stereotypes emerge of that particular society. For example people from other countries may stereotype British people to drink afternoon tea with biscuits, this may be the case for the majority of British people, yet I’m sure there are more people like me who don’t drink tea yet this is due to personal preferences as opposed to British cultural values. The majority of foods people eat reflect their cultural and religious beliefs as their food is integrated with their way of life and gives a meaning of survival, and forms the societies we live in.
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