COMMENSALITY - essay
Title: The rise and decline of commensality - exploring cultural shifts in the pursuit of reconnection through shared eating.
This essay explores our evolving food ecosystem and expresses how our rituals and habits around the table expose a disconnect from traditional communal dining. Our individualised food patterns often disregard the importance of communal eating, this poses the main question of the essay : Have we lost the simple action of breaking bread with friends and family?
This essay explores our evolving food ecosystem and expresses how our rituals and habits around the table expose a disconnect from traditional communal dining. Our individualised food patterns often disregard the importance of communal eating, this poses the main question of the essay : Have we lost the simple action of breaking bread with friends and family?
2024
INTRODUCTION
The practice of sharing food around the table is grammatically described as commensality. Commensality, however, is a social practice necessary for human development and promotes the importance of cultural rituals. Acknowledging how this communal way of sharing has significantly altered our food ecosystem creates the body of this essay. Discussions and research will outline how our relationship with the table has changed through historical and current periods. Ages of new food systems, such as the convenience era and the rise of desk dining, are crucial turning points that suggest recognisable changes to the food system. Critically analysing these landscapes will help us develop an understanding that demonstrates how we should eat in the future.
Our rate of food consumerism is cultivating a system that is out of control through the constant vast availability and consumer needs. Research suggests how ‘the global food system is broken’ through undernourishment or high levels of obesity. It is prevalent how damaging processed foods are to our physical health, similarly to how negative eating on the go is for our social health. The way to make change is predominantly from government action, which will be discussed; however, communities engaging with the table and the food on it suggest how possible rituals have the power to make change, too. Identifying these communities across the world who are tirelessly working not only to unite individuals but also to make social change frames the later part of the essay.
This essay is a necessary body of analytical research because it could be said that commensality is lost through how the current food system values eating at the table. Furthermore, the rise of technology and the varied time patterns in our day allow individualised eating to become the new normal. These new rituals we partake in daily as a society create a lack of social interaction and disregard the values of generosity, which are detrimental to our health and well-being.
The structure of the chaptered essay firstly allows for understanding the terms and theories associated with commensality, additionally highlighting how religious and cultural rituals have kept communal eating alive. The next chapter addresses the rise of convenience and the potential negative impacts this has had on commensality. Balancing these negatives out structures the final chapter, which aims to identify ways communities, architecture and institutions are striving to put commensality back on the plate. Evaluating these varied case studies will suggest how we can look to the future of communal dining and the scale of its necessity in the food system.
*The length of this essay has created a concise overview of potential areas that would be imperative to explore further in the future if this study were to transform into a design process. For example, the discussions on religious rituals only mention Christian examples; this was decided as there was a more substantial need for in-depth research in one area rather than three. This first section introduces the term commensality in depth through historical reference points and the work of significant sociologists.
The practice of sharing food around the table is grammatically described as commensality. Commensality, however, is a social practice necessary for human development and promotes the importance of cultural rituals. Acknowledging how this communal way of sharing has significantly altered our food ecosystem creates the body of this essay. Discussions and research will outline how our relationship with the table has changed through historical and current periods. Ages of new food systems, such as the convenience era and the rise of desk dining, are crucial turning points that suggest recognisable changes to the food system. Critically analysing these landscapes will help us develop an understanding that demonstrates how we should eat in the future.
Our rate of food consumerism is cultivating a system that is out of control through the constant vast availability and consumer needs. Research suggests how ‘the global food system is broken’ through undernourishment or high levels of obesity. It is prevalent how damaging processed foods are to our physical health, similarly to how negative eating on the go is for our social health. The way to make change is predominantly from government action, which will be discussed; however, communities engaging with the table and the food on it suggest how possible rituals have the power to make change, too. Identifying these communities across the world who are tirelessly working not only to unite individuals but also to make social change frames the later part of the essay.
This essay is a necessary body of analytical research because it could be said that commensality is lost through how the current food system values eating at the table. Furthermore, the rise of technology and the varied time patterns in our day allow individualised eating to become the new normal. These new rituals we partake in daily as a society create a lack of social interaction and disregard the values of generosity, which are detrimental to our health and well-being.
The structure of the chaptered essay firstly allows for understanding the terms and theories associated with commensality, additionally highlighting how religious and cultural rituals have kept communal eating alive. The next chapter addresses the rise of convenience and the potential negative impacts this has had on commensality. Balancing these negatives out structures the final chapter, which aims to identify ways communities, architecture and institutions are striving to put commensality back on the plate. Evaluating these varied case studies will suggest how we can look to the future of communal dining and the scale of its necessity in the food system.
*The length of this essay has created a concise overview of potential areas that would be imperative to explore further in the future if this study were to transform into a design process. For example, the discussions on religious rituals only mention Christian examples; this was decided as there was a more substantial need for in-depth research in one area rather than three. This first section introduces the term commensality in depth through historical reference points and the work of significant sociologists.
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