Bodies, matter and feminist freedoms: Revisiting the politics of food

Abstract

abstractFood items, eating practices and the various forms of work associated with food are not only shaped by social and cultural contexts and meanings, they are also generative, actively forging connections among social beings, linking bodies to organic matter and anchoring human beings in nature. Since food is often connected to gendered divisions of labour and feminised work, it creates a locus for work, creativity and pleasure that transcend realms of human reproduction as shaped by the market, patriarchy and alienating labour. By drawing on auto-ethnography and observation, this article explores the meaning-making and human experiences that food work can generate, considering how feminist perspectives on food politics should focus not only on constraining relationships and discourses, but also on liberating and creative ones. By reflecting on a range of practices, representations and processes of food work, the article considers their implications for feminist explorations of agency and resistance.