Good to Eat: Riddles of Food and CultureWhy are human food habits so diverse? Why do Americans recoil at the thought of dog meat? Jews and Moslems, pork? Hindus, beef? Why do Asians abhor milk? In Good to Eat, best-selling author Marvin Harris leads readers on an informative detective adventure to solve the worlds major food puzzles. He explains the diversity of the worlds gastronomic customs, demonstrating that what appear at first glance to be irrational food tastes turn out really to have been shaped by practical, economic, or political necessity. In addition, his smart and spirited treatment sheds wisdom on such topics as why there has been an explosion in fast food, why history indicates that its bad to eat people but good to kill them, and why children universally reject spinach. Good to Eat is more than an intellectual adventure in food for thought. It is a highly readable, scientifically accurate, and fascinating work that demystifies the causes of myriad human cultural differences. |
From inside the book
... aversions can be explained, their explanation “must be sought not in the nature of the food items” but rather in a “people's underlying thought pattern.” Or expressed in a more strident idiom: “Food has little to do with nourishment. We ...
... foods, like ill winds, often bring someone some good. Food preferences and aversions arise out of favorable balances of practical costs and benefits, but I do not say that the favorable balance is shared equally by all 16.
... aversions to animal flesh among Brahmans, Buddhists, and members of less influential religious groups such as the Jains and Seventh-Day Adventists would take me far afield. For the moment, all I need to say is that less than 1 percent ...
... aversion to beef. India also has 700 million people. Since no one denies that much of this huge human population is sorely in need of more proteins and calories, the refusal to kill and eat cattle seems to be “plainly contrary to ...
... aversion to beef helps to prevent the development of large-scale domestic or international markets for Indian beef, it continues to protect the typical smallholder from bankruptcy and landlessness. Unfettered development of large-scale ...
Contents
13 | |
19 | |
47 | |
The Abominable Pig
| 67 |
Hippophagy
| 88 |
Holy Beef USA
| 109 |
Lactophiles and Lactophobes Milk Lovers and Milk Haters
| 130 |
Small Things
| 154 |
Dogs Cats Dingoes and Other Pets
| 175 |
People Eating
| 199 |
Better to Eat
| 235 |
References | 249 |
Bibliography | 258 |
Index | 275 |