wanted: good social history of diets and dietting (global rather than local)

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ie to cover the what when where and WHY of:
religious diets
fashion-driven diets
health-related diets
general social/economic/geography-determined diets
political-cultural diets

(inc.anecdotes of pioneers, theorists, heroes, nutcases etc ideally)

(like eg the guy who discovered VASELINE recommended you eat a spoonful a day!)

(but i want history ancient and modern) (ie from paleolithic to futurama)

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 14:54 (twenty years ago)

i am unlikely to finish books which are shouty or badly written, so vet yr hobbyhorse's mouthpiece b4 suggestion!!

but any which if good generally and FULL OF FACTS AND STORIES AND even SPECULATION acceptable, from whatever quarter, fr.whitecoated wall-of-orthodoxy scienticians to fashionista kabbalists to secret hobnobarian

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 14:57 (twenty years ago)

(perfect models: william h. mcneill's "plagues and peoples")

(which i strenuously recommend btw: the history of all illness in 320 pb pp)

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:00 (twenty years ago)

I bet this is interesting though not quite what you're asking for:
http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0415232333.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

― Archel (Archel), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:03 (twenty years ago)

Not QUITE what you're after, I think, but a professor here who teaches on women's health issues often puts Becky Thompson's A Hunger So Wide and Deep on reserve. A study of eating disorders among American women in particular, but I gather it is a social study as well. I'll keep my eye open for what else we have around here, as other titles have crossed my path before...

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:07 (twenty years ago)

ned that one looks as if its focus = a bit TOO geographically, culturally and temporally specific (even given america = world's most multicutural multitemporal society ever)

i want a-z if poss

archel that does look interesting, esp. galen's buddy's rack of tiny white umbrellas

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:11 (twenty years ago)

Ooh that McNeill book looks great.

― Jordan (Jordan), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:13 (twenty years ago)

Okay, Mark, here's a couple of others I've found on short notice, but no info as to their quality or not:

Human diet : its origin and evolution / edited by Peter S. Ungar and Mark F. Teaford

Never satisfied : a cultural history of diets, fantasies, and fat / Hillel Schwartz

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:17 (twenty years ago)

The latter on further review appears again to be too specific for your needs, given its US focus; however, don't overlook the possibility it has a great bibliography of general sources!

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 15:21 (twenty years ago)

Brumberg. Joan Jacob. (1988). Fasting girls : the emergence of anorexia nervosa as a modern disease. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

If you search in Amazon, she has another book that was published by another publisher, but the following year. I think that's probably the one that I read, but it may have the same content. It has stuff about fasting in the Middle Ages. IIRC, her basic argument is that religious fasting was perceived as empowering. Anorectics try to achieve that, but the social context is different, so they don't.

― youn, Thursday, 24 February 2005 16:52 (twenty years ago)

The McNeill book is most excellent and cannot be recommended too highly. The book mark s wants is a book that should be written - but, probably hasn't been, yet.

― Aimless (Aimless), Thursday, 24 February 2005 16:58 (twenty years ago)

The anthropology of food and body : gender, meaning, and power / Carole M. Counihan.
All manners of food : eating and taste in England and France from the Middle Ages to the present / Stephen Mennell.
A sociology of food & nutrition : the social appetite / edited by John Germov and Lauren Williams
Maybe not precisely what you want, but these were listed under food habits-psychology

― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:00 (twenty years ago)

Any use?

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0814798241/103-4808450-5197413

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:01 (twenty years ago)

thanks all, this is a great start

i'm not just interested in diets to get thin though

ie i'm also interested in food taboos, sane and not so sane; cause and effects of monodiets (cf ireland and the potato); and just generally what ppl won't eat and why

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:55 (twenty years ago)

"the man who first ate an oyster was a brave fellow" — dr johnson

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:56 (twenty years ago)

Your Velveeta curiosity has roots, I see.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:56 (twenty years ago)

Friend Stripey has ALWAYS been baffled at how saffron's virtues were figured out.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:57 (twenty years ago)

ned i am totally fascinated by food generally

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/1580080510.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 17:59 (twenty years ago)

Num!

Remind me to have a good meal with you when I'm over there. Not that the Indian place we had a nosh at was bad or anything.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:01 (twenty years ago)

the bug place in sloane square closed down i think :(

dr vick SEZ she had scorpion when she wz in china

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:03 (twenty years ago)

hi mark!!

― geeta (geeta), Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:37 (twenty years ago)

marge: is that too spicy for you?
lisa: i CaN sEe ThRoUgH tImE

― mark s (mark s), Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:37 (twenty years ago)

haha

― j blount (papa la bas), Thursday, 24 February 2005 18:43 (twenty years ago)

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