Meals to Come: A History of the Future of Food (California Studies in Food and Culture) [Paperback]

Warren Belasco (Author)

Book Description

Series: California Studies in Food and Culture | Publication Date: October 18, 2006

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.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The ways in which "the future of food" has been addressed in the past are myriad, as detailed by University of Maryland American Studies professor Belasco. In this heavily annotated study, Belasco (Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture Took on the Food Industry) focuses on "a long-standing romantic fascination with extravagant technology alongside a rich tradition of skepticism and alarm." Part one, "Debating the Future of Food," explores how questions of food security and supply have been framed and discussed over the centuries, with a focus on the recent past. Part two, "Imagining the Future of Food" is subtitled "Speculative Fiction," and covers food utopias and dystopias-or idealizations and nightmare scenarios for how and what people will eat. Part three, "Things To Come" is subtitled "Three Cornucopian Futures." It details "material assertions of optimism as found in world's fairs, restaurants, stores and kitchens-as well as in upbeat feature stories that function largely to sell the cornucopian future" and covers most of the 20th century. A postscript covers the future as currently envisioned. The discussion is smart and comprehensive, but dense. With 24 b/w photos.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Warren Belasco is a witty, wonderfully observant guide to the hopes and fears that every era projects onto its culinary future. This enlightening study reads like time-travel for foodies." - Laura Shapiro, author of Something From the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America "Warren Belasco serves up an intellectual feast, brilliantly dissecting two centuries of expectations regarding the future of food and hunger. Meals to Come provides an essential guide to thinking clearly about the worrisome question as to whether the world can ever be adequately and equitably fed." - Joseph J. Corn, co-author of Yesterday's Tomorrows: Past Visions of the American Future "This astute, sly, warmly human critique of the basic belly issues that have absorbed and defined Americans politically, socially, and economically for the past 200 years is a knockout. Warren Belasco's important book, crammed with knowledge, is absolutely necessary for an understanding of where we are now." - Betty Fussell, author of My Kitchen Wars"

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Product Details

• Paperback: 393 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (October 18, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520250354
• ISBN-13: 978-0520250352
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #602,861 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not just a textbook..., January 20, 2008

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This review is from: Meals to Come: A History of the Future of Food (California Studies in Food and Culture) (Paperback)

First off, let me say that this book is not just a dry, dusty, tome of facts and figures. This is a funny, common sense filled book about the future of food, starting with a two hundred plus history of how mankind saw food. What would we eat? Would we have enough? Should we give up meat? After this foundation the author, Warren Belasco, slips us into the places and people who have shaped our ideas of future food. World fairs, Walt Disney, futurists, science fiction writers, businesses, car companies, and so on. This is really an enjoyable book. Yet it also asks us some serious questions about the future and where food is place in it. Do we want meat? Do we want food pills? Do we want to have any say in what it tastes like? Anybody who enjoys history or science fiction or future history needs this book!