Food fetish

While selected articles are available in full on this website, all Arena Quarterly, Arena Magazine and Arena Journal articles are available for to view in PDF format via Informit. You can purchase the article, or access Informit for free via a public library account, such as the State Library of Victoria. We get a small amount of money from Informit for you accessing the article in this way, so get a bit of material support too.

Abstract:

It is fair to say Australians are obsessed with food media – take a look at the magazine section of your local newsagent and you still find a swag of glossies emblazoned with the lush imagery of gourmet delights. Flick on the television and your eyes will, before long, stumble across some sort of reality television program involving food, cooking and the inevitable product placement alongside it. As a type of commodity fetishism, it joins many of the others already out there and is hardly surprising in itself. Yet there is also a much more peculiar development: the simultaneous rise of weight loss programs has not had the expected result of reversing this food fetishism, but has in fact compounded it.

Details / PDF:

The full-text PDF of this article can be downloaded from Informit. You can purchase the article, or access Informit for free via a public library account, such as the State Library of Victoria.

Support Arena

Independent publications and critical thought are more important than ever. Arena has never relied on or received government funding. It has sustained its activities largely through the voluntary work and funding provided by editors and supporters. If Arena is to continue and to expand its readership, we need your support to do it.