Meals to Come: A History of the Future of Food / Edition 1

by Warren Belasco

Overview

In this provocative and lively addition to his acclaimed writings on food, Warren Belasco takes a sweeping look at a little-explored yet timely topic: humanity's deep-rooted anxiety about the future of food. People have expressed their worries about the future of the food supply in myriad ways, and here Belasco explores a fascinating array of material ranging over two hundred years—from futuristic novels and films to world's fairs, Disney amusement parks, supermarket and restaurant architecture, organic farmers' markets, debates over genetic engineering, and more. Placing food issues in this deep historical context, he provides an innovative framework for understanding the future of food today—when new prophets warn us against complacency at the same time that new technologies offer promising solutions. But will our grandchildren's grandchildren enjoy the cornucopian bounty most of us take for granted? This first history of the future to put food at the center of the story provides an intriguing perspective on this question for anyone—from general readers to policy analysts, historians, and students of the future—who has wondered about the future of life's most basic requirement.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520250352
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	10/18/2006
Series:	California Studies in Food and Culture , #16
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	393
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Warren Belasco, Professor of American Studies at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, is author of Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took on the Food Industry and Americans on the Road: From Autocamp to Motel and coeditor of Food Nations: Selling Taste in Consumer Societies.

Table of Contents

Preface

PART I. DEBATING THE FUTURE OF FOOD: THE BATTLE OF THE THINK TANKS
1. The Stakes in Our Steaks
2. The Debate: Will the World Run Out of Food?
3. The Deep Structure of the Debate

PART II. IMAGINING THE FUTURE OF FOOD: SPECULATIVE FICTION
4. The Utopian Caveat
5. Dystopias

PART III. THINGS TO COMEE: THREE CORNUCOPIAN FUTURES
6. The Classical Future
7. The Modernist Future
8. The Recombinant Future

Postscript
Notes
Selected Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index

Editorial Reviews

In his latest book, Belasco (American studies, Univ. of Maryland Baltimore Cty.; Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took on the Food Industry) surveys the history of thinking about the future of the food supply and modern culture. Will an overpopulated planet run out of food, will science find a way to feed more people, or will society find a way to overcome scarcity and share the bounty? Belasco explores this seemingly modern debate that began over 200 years ago with Thomas Malthus, William Godwin, and the Marquis de Condorcet. He examines past policies, statistical projections, science fiction, World's Fair displays, supermarkets, and even Disney World's Tomorrowland, looking for false predictions of the future of food. Particularly amusing is an account of "chlorella cuisine," an algae-based food source project sponsored by major research institutions such as the Rockefeller Foundation and Stanford University. While Belasco doesn't commit to making any predictions on the future of food himself, this history of the debate between Malthusians and cornucopians provides intriguing background on humanity's anxiety regarding the food supply. Recommended for academic collections and large public libraries.-Pauline Baughman, Multnomah Cty. Lib., Portland, OR Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal