No one can deny the fact that food is the most crucial aspect of our life, and no culture, social and economic desire could be realized without our relation and identification with food. We eat food to satisfy our physical and emotional needs but there is more to it. At the crux of every of our social and culture activity, it is a food that makes us identifiable to the rest of the world and associated with the people whom we matter the most. During the time of feasting, we develop close intimate relationship with the others. Good food gives us ecstatic feeling and a feeling of fulfillment.
There is no debate or controversy by anthropologists on the fact that food is a symbol of culture and identity and is a mirror of much of our activities and the relationships developed with the organizations. It is also the most important part of the economic activity especially among the economies based on the agriculture. Food also constitutes an important component in many religious rituals among many religions across the world and satiates our spiritual needs.
Though anthropologists agree about the food as a national and religious symbol yet they differentiate on the degree of this relationship. For the cultural materialists, human beings preference for food is their natural responses to the materialistic conditions surrounding them, while for cultural idealists, their preferences for food are their own personal beliefs without any logic behind it. Both these theories are complete in themselves and explain the exact unbound relationship between the culture and food.
Cultural idealists suggest that difference in the preferences of food by human beings is the result of the differences in their culture. Eating behavior adopted by the people is a part of their cultural code and expresses our relation and our unique cultural identity towards the rest of the world.
Besides, cultural idealists give three explanations for the variation of the food behavior: one as the food culture as a result of our impulse drive towards that particular food; secondly they are symbolic of the cultural beliefs and practices; and thirdly the choices made are the result of our inheritance. Unlike cultural materialists, cultural idealists found that human beings do not make their choices of food on the basis of their nutritional value rather on food habits they have inherited from their ancestors. As said by Carole Counihan, “Food is a prism that absorbs and reflects a host of cultural phenomenon.” (Counihan, 6)
The examination of the food reflects much of the societal conditions, and it becomes significant aspect of the power and strength among the economically dominant sections of the society and also becomes the mirror of the various gender specific roles ought to be played to create a balance structure and approach in the society. Variations in the food habits of people in the society in general and ethnic race and family in particular create a barrier among them which though are not visible through the naked eyes but the impact of which is so strong that it is in our daily lives and in our daily chores.
The best example is the culture of Florentines. They have adopted in their daily routine, light breakfast with heavy meal at lunch and dinnertime. Their meal forms three-course- in the first course they have pasta, rice or soup. In the second course, they eat meat and vegetables and in third course, they cherish fruits. They would try every method to prepare the right way to prepare their basic dishes like spaghetti with tomato sauce yet there is no doubt of the fact that they feel that their cuisine is unique and differs than the rest of the Italian food.
Their food is originated from the centuries farming system of sharecropping that allows them to adopt the intensive system of agriculture near the cities enabling the people to enjoy fresh food all the year round. (Counihan, 6-7) In the Amazon region, Indian tribes differentiate among themselves on the basis of their culture, habits, clothes and moreover on their eating habits.
Mary Douglas has construed the most important understanding on the anthropological aspect of food. She caught our attention on the social importance of food in our daily lives. Douglas has noticed various indigenous classifications of food and its relationship with their specific social groups. (Meigs, 95) Another aspect to it is how the food and eating becomes a means of unification of the diverse objects and organism both, as Meigs said, psychologically and mystically in a single unity. This characteristic of the food has a very important implication for the community Hua and about their understanding of their self.
Hua’s has a population around 3100 residing at the slopes of Mount Michael (Hua Roko) near the Lufa district office. Their staple diet is sweet potato that is grown all the year around with other food items like taro, yams, bananas, sugar canes, other leafy green vegetables on seasonal basis. Since they came into contact with Europeans in1950, they have been cultivating potatoes, corn, peanuts, cucumbers, beans etc. They also possess herds of pigs which are being since centuries reared by women and therefore pork became a part of their daily diet. Word Hua means “for everything” “do ado Na”. In other words it means “that which can be eaten and that which cannot.” (Meigs, 95-96)
Food and eating is a part of the culture and food production and the number of rules that are adopted in the production of food is often the topic of their conversation. Food is also depicted in their folklore and tales and people remember the food they cherish while conversing and or dreaming.
Anthropologists also opine that there is a close relationship between the food habits among human beings and their nature. Crops are heavily dependent on the weather and climate conditions of the areas and therefore the very particular crops become their staple diet. For e.g. Rice is grown in areas receiving heavy monsoon and therefore rice forms a staple diet for the people residing in these areas. Another aspect to it is explained by Nick Fiddes who said that human beings food habits and its relevant close relation with environment originate from their subconscious level and opinion of the same is held at communal level.
He gave the example of meat eating by many people across the world and has symbolic significance. He states that “time and again in different contexts, culture, social groups and periods of history, meat is supreme”, (Fiddes, 13) and it is related to the economic capacity of the people.
Fiddes revealed that in most of the nations higher the income of the people higher is their propensity to consume flesh. As Julia Twigg notes, “Meat is the highly prized food and is the center around which meal is arranged.” (Fiddes, 13) Meat is so important for the people all over the world that people describe them as “meat- hunger” (Fiddes, 13) This means that humans are genetically programmed for preference of animal food. But Fiddes argue that there is no specific reason on why human beings consume meat. It is all the matter of their specific interest and liking.
About the meat he says, “Meat has the potential both to comfort and nourish us. It also confuses and confounds us. It revolts and satisfies us. It meets a need in us. There is something very curious about the meat” (Fiddes, 19). But several people across the world contradict this view on meat. It is Fiddes only who says that reluctance for the meat is nothing but avoidance in taking part in killing of animals.
Many religions forbid eating flesh, as with the religion of Israelites, “Of their flesh you shall not eat, and their carcasses you shall not touch; they are unclean to you (Lev 11: 11)…everyone who touches them shall be unclean”. (Harris, 54)
Mary Douglas said that if language is a code then its pre-coded message is linguistic language, in the same way food is a code, the message it encoded will be found in the pattern of social relations, in which it is expressed. “Like sex, taking of food has both social as well as biological component.” (Douglas, 231)
The food is as much part of the social construction as it is a part of our psychological and biological behavior. The food choice among the people is also genetically determined and are determined by their taste and liking. For Rozin, the best-documented indication is the liking for sweet and bitter taste and liking as well as distaste and hatred for certain foods. Studies on rats also show same biological basis as with human beings. (Rozin, 182)
Food for human beings is not just for survival and for the nutritious value attached to it but also to make the human beings realize their value and importance in relations to themselves, their society and to every one whom they matter the most and all the studies of anthropologists have been construed around this single concept.
Works Cited
Counihan, Carole M. “The Anthropology Of Food And Body: Gender, Meaning, and Power.” London/New York: Routledge, 1999.
Douglas, Mary. “Deciphering a Meal in Implicit Meanings: Selected Essays in Anthropology.” London: Routledge,1999. 231-251.
Fiddes, Nick. “Meat: a natural symbol”. London/New York: Routledge, 1991.
Harris, Marvin. “The Abominable Pig.” Food and Culture: A Reader. Eds. Carole Counihan, Counihan Carole & Penny Van Esterik. New York / London: Routledge, 2007. 54-66.
Meigs, Anna. “Food as Cultural Construction.” Food and Culture: A Reader. Eds. Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik. New York/London: Routledge, 1997. 95-106.
Mintz, Sidney W. & Bois, Christine M. Du. “THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF FOOD AND EATING.” Annual Review of Anthropology, 2002, Vol. 31: 99-119.
Rozin, Paul. “Psychobiological perspectives on food preferences and avoidances.” Food and Evolution: Toward a Theory of Human Food Habits. Eds. Harris, Marvin and Ross, Eric B. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987. 181-205,605-606.