Sociology of Food

Jean-Pierre Poulain is Professor of Sociology at the University of Toulouse II Jean Jaurès, France, and Chair of Food Studies: Food, Cultures and Health at Taylor's-Toulouse University Centre, Malaysia. He is the author of a number of books on the sociology of food and tourism. His work has been translated into Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Chinese and Japanese.

• List of figures and tablesPrefaceList of abbreviationsIntroductionPart 1: Permanent and Changing Aspects in Modern Eating PracticesChapter 1: The Globalization of the Food Supply: De-localization and Re-localizationChapter 2: Between the Domestic and the Economic Spheres: The Ebb and Flow of Culinary ActivityChapter 3: The Evolution of Eating PracticesChapter 4: From Food Risks and Food Safety to Anxiety ManagementChapter 5: Obesity and the Medicalization of Everyday Food ConsumptionPart 2: From Sociological Interest in Food to Sociologies of FoodChapter 1: The Major Socio-Anthropological Movements and Their Encounters with the "Food Social Fact"Chapter 2: Epistemiological ObstaclesChapter 3: From Sociological Interest in Food to Sociologies of FoodChapter 4: The Sociologies of Food and Attempts to Make ConnectionsChapter 5: The Sociology of French GastronomyChapter 6: The Food Social Space: A Tool for the Study of Food PatternsAs a Conclusion: The Call for Constructivist PositivismReferencesIndex

This timely translation adds an important Continental perspective to the English-language food canon, while also reaching forward to the cross-disciplinarity that characterizes contemporary Food Studies. Poulain’s framing of systemic complexities and multiple sociologies reminds us of the critical importance of thinking-and-doing both through and with food—a holistic and necessary approach.