Food, Anthropology of

Abstract

Food sustains us, connects us to one another, and embeds us in the material, energetic, and spiritual cycles of the ecologies we inhabit. The anthropology of food has a rich history, which addresses fundamental questions about humanity. Food has been instrumental in human evolution and the development of culture and society, yet the ways people define what is and is not food varies throughout the world, as well as how food is classified and distinguished from medicinal, poisonous, and other ingested materials. In particular, understanding of the overlap between food and mind-altering substances reveals the crucial role that "drug-foods" played in the development of colonialism and globalization. Consuming various foods may represent shared identities, political divisions, health imperatives, and spiritual duties, or lack thereof. Currently, malnourishment and other disordered eating patterns are manifestations of the imbalances in global food production and distribution systems. With growing skepticism about corporate, biotechnological approaches to food crises, permaculture and other grassroots initiatives offer promise for the future. Food in human evolution Humanity began by gathering, scavenging, hunting, and, eventually, cooking food. Archaeological and ethnographic evidence suggests that in most climates the diets of foragers have been predominately plant based. We have long, coevolutionary relationships with many plant species that we eat. Foraging humans most likely ingested long-lived plants with high concentrations of secondary compounds that provided protection against disease and pests. Some of these plant compounds also would have placed selective pressure on the people who consumed them, perhaps even altering their genetic profiles over generations. Nevertheless, the consumption of meat is understood to have played an equally important role in the evolution of Homo sapiens. As humans radiated out of Africa, scavenging and hunting animals were associated with skeletal, digestive, and cognitive changes in our bodies, as well as having an impact on our social organization, technological development, and relationships with the natural and spiritual world. Our consumption of herd animals eventually led to their domestication, as well as pastoralist lifestyles, while fishing drew us to coastal plains, estuaries, and river valleys where we first began to cultivate plants intensively.