Book ID: CBB923625897

The Meat Question: Animals, Humans, and the Deep History of Food (2019)

unapi

Berson, Josh (Author)


The MIT Press


Publication Date: 2019
Physical Details: 320
Language: English

A provocative argument that eating meat is not what made humans human and that the future is not necessarily carnivorous.Humans are eating more meat than ever. Despite ubiquitous Sweetgreen franchises and the example set by celebrity vegans, demand for meat is projected to grow at twice the rate of demand for plant-based foods over the next thirty years. Between 1960 and 2010, per capita meat consumption in the developing world more than doubled; in China, meat consumption grew ninefold. It has even been claimed that meat made us human―that our disproportionately large human brains evolved because our early human ancestors ate meat. In The Meat Question, Josh Berson argues that not only did meat not make us human, but the contemporary increase in demand for meat is driven as much by economic insecurity as by affluence. Considering the full sweep of meat's history, Berson concludes provocatively that the future is not necessarily carnivorous.Berson, an anthropologist and historian, argues that we have the relationship between biology and capitalism backward. We may associate meat-eating with wealth, but in fact, meat-eating is a sign of poverty; cheap meat―hunger killing, easy to prepare, eaten on the go―enables a capitalism defined by inequality. To answer the meat question, says Berson, we need to think about meat-eating in a way that goes beyond Paleo diets and PETA protests to address the deeply entwined economic and political lives of humans and animals past, present, and future.

...More
Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB923625897/

Similar Citations

Book Wilson J. Warren; (2018)
Meat Makes People Powerful: A Global History of the Modern Era (/isis/citation/CBB191901096/)

Article Kate O’Riordan; Aristea Fotopoulou; Neil Stephens; (2016)
The First Bite: Imaginaries, Promotional Publics and the Laboratory Grown Burger (/isis/citation/CBB047335526/)

Article Brinkmann, Sören; (2014)
Leite e modernidade: ideologia e políticas de alimentação na era Vargas (/isis/citation/CBB001420714/)

Book J. L. Anderson; (2019)
Capitalist Pigs: Pigs, Pork, and Power in America (/isis/citation/CBB423278889/)

Article Erik Jönsson; (October 2016)
Benevolent technotopias and hitherto unimaginable meats: Tracing the promises of in vitro meat (/isis/citation/CBB251007166/)

Book Lisa T. Sarasohn; (2021)
Getting Under Our Skin: The Cultural and Social History of Vermin (/isis/citation/CBB825215949/)

Book Benjamin R. Cohen; (2019)
Pure Adulteration: Cheating on Nature in the Age of Manufactured Food (/isis/citation/CBB174903984/)

Article Roslyng, Mette Marie; (2011)
Challenging the Hegemonic Food Discourse: The British Media Debate on Risk and Salmonella in Eggs (/isis/citation/CBB001034637/)

Book Danilo Gasparini; (2022)
Cerealia. La civiltà dei cereali nei secoli: storia e storie (/isis/citation/CBB512731896/)

Article Rebecca J. H. Woods; (2020)
The Shape of Meat: Preserving Animal Flesh in Victorian Britain (/isis/citation/CBB234289669/)

Book Campkin, Ben; Cox, Rosie; (2007)
Dirt: New Geographies of Cleanliness and Contamination (/isis/citation/CBB001031281/)

Book Lisa Haushofer; (2022)
Wonder Foods: The Science and Commerce of Nutrition (/isis/citation/CBB755765560/)

Authors & Contributors
Jönsson, Erik
Warren, Wilson J.
Danilo Gasparini
Fotopoulou, Aristea
Haushofer, Lisa
Stephens, Neil
Concepts
Food and foods
Public health
Science and society
Meat industry and trade
Public opinion
Food safety
Time Periods
19th century
20th century
21st century
20th century, late
18th century
Medieval
Places
Great Britain
United States
Brazil
Sicily
Sweden
North America
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment