Food, Ideology and Critical Semiotics

Food is intrinsically related to ideology. This is evident since the very definition of “edibility”, with different cultures selecting, within a wide range of products with nutritional capacity, a more or less large quantity destined to become, for them, “food”. And it is further remarked by the extreme variation characterising taste and “eatability”, as well as by the broad range of possible systems of classification and categorization of food, based on the most diverse principles. Food choices and practices, in other terms, can be seen as acts of signification allowing people to establish and sustain their identities. These acts, as well as the multiple cultural representations that support and are supported by them, serve as vehicles through which ideological expectations are circulated, enforced, and transgressed. This papers deals with these crucial issues from a semiotic point of view, resulting in the identification of the main aspects that should characterise a critical approach to food and food ideologies.