After reading the article from the center for foodborne illness, I found that there are a lot of long-term health outcomes that many people are unaware of when it comes to their food. As Tanya Roberts says, "foodborne illness must be recongnized as a serious public health issue if we want to make meaninful progress in reducing sickness, injury,, and death associated with foodbourne disease." Within the rest of the article they discuss their reasearch on the health outcomes for five foodbourne pathogens and the various symptoms; I found that to be alarming. Many of the outbreaks are from common food products like ground beef, peppers, peanut butter etc. Since the increase in population and a food supply that is global, in 2008 the government added an oversight to food safety becacause of the risks involved with the publics health. Towards the end, they urge to have more research and focus on the prevention of long term health outcomes. That brings me to our quesiton, are consumer's really being protected from the food industry, and what it comes down to is the consumer;s roll in the matter and what they choose to eat.
Schlosser, Eric. “Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation: Why the Fries Taste Good (Excerpt).” 26 March 2010. Pbs. 28 November 2010
http://www.pbs.org/pov/foodinc/fastfoodnation_01.php Within the excerpt, Fast Food Nation: Why the Fries Taste Good, Eric Scholosser starts off describing his experience to the J. R. Simplot plan in Idaho and how the potatoes are made in the factory. Then he leads into some background information on John Richard Simplot, one of the richest men who started it all from being main supplier of potatoes in the 1920’s up to frozen French fries starting in the 1950’s. He believed that the frozen food technology would be the food for the future, and looking at it now he was right. As the popularity increased, he then branched out and made a deal to supply the frozen fries to McDonalds. I found it very interesting to all of Simplot's accomplishments at such a young age and the success he achieved throughout his life. Pollan, Michael. “Our National Eating Disorder.” Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: The Penguin Press, 2006. 1-11. Pollan, Michael. “The Farm.” Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: The Penguin Press, 2006. 32-56. Within the reading, The Omnivores Dilemma by Michael Pollan, he writes about how society today has various changes with our eating habits. That we all have so many choices in the different things that we can eat that makes it a dilemma to decided. In result that leads to some of the eating disorders we have today. Many different aspects come into the production of our food, and especially with the labeling as well. Today people are on the go and busy with their lives and do not pay too much attention to what it is they’re eating. After watching Food, Inc. by Robert Kenner and hearing about how diabetes is now starting to effect children at epidemic alerts, I thought I would like to find out more information about people with this condition to find out what it's like and why it is becoming more prevalent in today’s society. I decided to interview a co-worker, Angela, whose son was diagnosed with type one diabetes at the age of 7. First he just appeared to have the flu, but as time went on the symptoms did not. She also noticed he started to drink large amounts of water as well as go to the bathroom very frequently. At times he would just fall asleep at random times during the day, so she knew something was not right and found out that is what it was. Before our discussion I was unsure of the differences between type one and type 2 and I found that with type one it is usually diagnosed within childhood, and the body does not produce insulin. With the help of insulin therapy and other treatments, the children can learn to manage their condition. Then type two diabetes, which is the most common, is when the body does not produce enough insulin.
Berry, W. (1990). The Pleasures of eating. In What are People for? North Point Press.
When reading the Pleasures of Eating by Wendell Berry, I could not agree more with him because I feel the same way, and think that I would be what he considers to be a “consumer” for the food. He states, “They buy what they want—or what they have been persuaded to want – within the limits of what they can get.” Basically, we do not question anything about the food to how it got to the shelf, and regardless we just purchase what is there for us. He mentions that our society has become passive, uncritical, and depended consumers. People today have been persuaded to want food that has already been prepared for them because they believe it to be more convenient and cheaper. Further on he makes a claim that the industrial eater is a victim because they no longer know eating as an agricultural act, and does not connect between the land and food. Today many Americans are so busy with their lives, that they loose the site of that, and find it easier to just trust what they hear from the advertisements and supermarkets without the time to question. Though as this issue continues to evolve, the food industry is not concerned with the quality or heath but only producing a higher amount at a lower cost. That leaves many negative effects to our society and also changes the way we eat. Then Wendell Berry gives a list of what people can do to eat more responsibly which in the end result people can enjoy their food more.  Kenner, R. (Producer, Director) and Scholsser, E. (Producer). (2008). Food, Inc. [DVD]. Magnolia. Home Entertainment. After watching the movie Food, Inc. in class, it opened my eyes to some of the things I have never thought of when it comes to my food. Usually I just eat without looking at labels or even wondering where my food was coming from. Though within the film, they wanted to show people the things that have been hidden from us within the production of our food. Basically, the government does not want us to know the truth of what we were actually eating and how inhumanely the animals were being treated. Now the majority of our foods are coming from only a few corporations that leads to dangerous outcomes and is more prone to harmful bacteria that is spread more rapidly because of it. Some of the meat companies like Tyson and Perdue declined to interview. Though one of Perdue previous growers, Carol, was one of the only ones to let them into view the chickens. She explained the different things they do to the chickens that they grow within 49 days now instead of three months, and they are enhanced to have more breasts for white meat. They discussed the different types of drugs they used to help in growing faster, and chemicals they use to help with the contaminations. They produce these chickens from the day they hatch, and they never see sunlight or can barely walk to carry their own weight. Now corn is almost in every product today, and since it is cheap that is what they feed the animals to help with their profits. The food supply of today is geared towards a low cost- higher production rate and is not necessarily concerned with the health of the people. Schneider, Stephen. (2008) Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of the Slow Food Movement. College English 70.4, 384-401.
The article, Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of The Slow Food Movement by Stephen Schneider discusses the what the movement is all about and the importance of healthy food. The information is primarliy based off of the founder of Slow Food, Carlo Petrini's work. He starts off by discussing a breif history of the movement and how it started back in the 1970's. Basically how slow foods should taste good and muliticultural, sustainable and safe, and fairly treated producers and consumers or in other words, "good, clean, fair". Stephen Schneider mentions that by people being more aware of movements like these will help educate everyone on the quailty of food that is out there and the agriculture The most rewarding aspect about conducting these interviews was that it was a chance for me to find out more information about my grandmother. We had a close relationship when I was growing up, but over the years have lost touch. It was interesting to hear about many details from her past, and her greatest childhood memory. It brought to my attention the differences in our generation compared to when she was growing up. I felt that sometimes as we were talking, we would get carried away and stray off topic. So trying to get the right information I was looking for was somewhat of a challenge. Though the most difficult aspect I found when conducting my interviews was making sure I was recording all of the data properly. My first interview was in person and handwritten, and that felt unorganized and all over the place with my notes. Since then she has went to Florida, and I wanted to be able to record the interviews. So, then I went to purchase a voice recorder and just had her answer my questions that way. Then uploading that to the site was another story! The end result was to purchase weebly pro… that was the only way I could figure out how to get it onto the site.
Quotes from my interview
"The house I was born in is still occupied by my brother and has been in our family for over 70 years." "My parents bought the house in 1936 for $1700.00." "No dishwasher, we were the dishwashers." The themes that emerged from my interviews so far was mainly what it was like growing up in the 40's and 50's. Another was when technology was first introduced and how that grew with her to present day. Prologue / interviews When I first thought about the oral history project, I immediately thought that interviewing my grandmother. It would be a great way to know more things about her that we wouldn't always necessarily discuss. I started out discussing the assignment with her, and let her know about the three interviews and some details. At first I was unsure of what I direction that I wanted to take. So, I began with some questions about literacy because I think it would be interesting with the difference in generations she has experienced. I found out alot of interesting information, however she did not recall much information on the begining of her literacy. Then from there that led into a discussion on technology. Where my Interview #1 When she was growing up she did not have a phone in her house until she was 18. She always had to go to the house down the street or the grocery store to make a quick call, and Mr. Atkins did not mind. Some of her friends had phones that lived across town, but not many people in town had one at the time. It was a party-line where about three different households shared the same line. When she would pick up the phone, one of her neighbors would be on it and she would have to wait. So making a call was not as easy and at times very inconvenient. Also she had no television, only a few people around had one. It was a black and white 5x7 screen where everyone would get together at the one persons house with one and were extremely excited to watch their favorite shows. There was no twenty four hour programing like today. There were only shows on at certain times and nights. Just about a half of a dozen show, and one she mentioned was milt and birch. That was how my interview had first started though we began to change direction as we went further |  ArchivesDecember 2010 Categories |
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