On December 4, 5, and 6, the symposium “Eating in the City” is being held in Paris, organized by the UNESCO Chair “World Foodways.”
This event brings together specialists in the socio-anthropology of food to place on the table, from this perspective, the relevant analyses regarding the main challenges involved in feeding the inhabitants of the major cities of Latin America, Asia, and Africa.
When discussing the eating habits of city dwellers, there is a tendency to generalize that a shift has occurred toward a “Western” food model, which today often carries a pejorative connotation. In practice, we see a diversity of ways of eating in cities, each responding to different logics. All these dietary styles present distinct issues related, for example, to health and nutrition status, as well as to market logics that change the most readily available products.
Moreover, today there is the challenge that food must be sustainable and respond to the ecological challenges our planet faces, partly due to intensive food production. This effect is not only ecological but is also reflected in people’s perceptions of food today. Distrust toward food is not a new issue, as it is a human condition for survival in a world of uncertainties. However, not all perceptions are shared in the same way nor have the same basis and/or justification.
Within the framework of this meeting, the ways in which cities are reconfiguring food will be analyzed, not only with the emergence of “new” foods but also with the ways of eating and the meanings these foods have for city dwellers, which are intimately related to the situations that arise both locally and globally.
In the case of Mexico, I will present an analysis of how eating out has become an everyday matter for millions of inhabitants of the country’s major cities. Eating outside the home, in addition to being a necessity due to the logic of large cities, takes on different connotations for their inhabitants. Among these connotations, we find a patrimonial dimension, in which people associate certain foods usually eaten outside as part of “eating Mexican” or “authentic Mexican food.” However, this dimension comes into conflict when medical or health considerations are taken into account. In this way, people constantly oppose what is considered Mexican with the notion of health. In other words, it is as if tacos, tortas, tamales, and pozole have a negative reputation when only the health dimension is considered, but this perception is positive when speaking of a shared identity. When health sector discourses spread messages about obesity and the number of tacos one should eat, but on the other hand, strategies are implemented to valorize food heritage for tourism purposes, something is wrong with the coherence of the messages. Eating in the city is a complex fact with multiple variables impacting the population, beyond considering food only for its caloric or nutritional content.
— This article was originally published in Spanish by Liliana Martínez Lomelí. Translation generated with AI from the original text.