Food that Matters

Boundary Work and the Case for Vegan Food Practices

Bibliographic Data

ID4859619
AuthorsSteffen Hirth (0000-0002-6719-1214, Sustainable Consumption Institute (SCI), Alliance Manchester Business School (AMBS) The University of Manchester Booth St W Manchester M15 6PB United Kingdom, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume61
Issue1
Pages234-254
Publication date2021-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociologia Ruralis (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0199 • E-ISSN: 1467-9523
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/soru.12317
OpenAlexW3035397004
LanguageEN
Citations received13
References cited38

Meat and, less so, dairy are contested for their significant ethical and social-ecological impacts. Abjuring animal products, veganism is conventionally treated as a dietary ideology related to consumer identities. Drawing upon practice and materialist turns, this article explores variations in the performance of veganism and how its boundaries are drawn. Yet, rather than an eating practice, I suggest to look at veganism more broadly and conceptualised as a food practice which also involves provisioning. By example of stockfree organic agriculture (SOA), a production-based, processual understanding is outlined by which plant foods are 'vegan' if animal by-products are not used as fertilisers in crop cultivation. Thereof, a conceptual case is made to shift the focus away from veganism as a consumer identity and towards performative vegan food practices (VFP) as a global responsibility to reduce the 'long shadow' of livestock and maintain Earth as a relatively safe operating space

Aesthetics · Consumption (sociology · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Materialism · Performative utterance · Social science · Sociology · Agriculture Sustainability and Environmental Impact · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Organic Food and Agriculture · Philosophy

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