CHINA'S FOOD
A Growing Number of Contradictions between...
Food Security
How to ensure the growth of the domestic consumption?
Political Economy, Macro-Economics, Law, ...
Public Health
How to mitigate the effects of consumption on public health?
Dietetics, Health Care, Nutrition Studies, ...
Food Safety
How to enhance the system of supervision & quality control?
Social Management, Engineering, ...
WHAT ABOUT TASTE?
Eating a socially-situated and subjectively-experienced practice.
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“People have some experience of eating—they don't just do it, they enjoy it or wish they could—day in and day out, in sickness and in health...
A political economy of eating emphasises the uneven distribution of nutritional resources, while a political phenomenology of eating attends to the social practices that make an experience of eating.”
(Farquhar 2002: 47)
The Tactical Turn of the Media Industries
Infiltrating Daily Life with Food
Hong Kong Local Champion
MORE THAN TEN YEARS WITHOUT GROWTH UNTIL THE RECENT BOOST FROM MOBILE CONNEXION
The public review website made the second-largest fundraising record for a Chinese startup after Xiaomi raised $1.1 billion Dec. 2014.
Food delivery service Ele.me is now China’s
third-most funded startup
ELE.ME HANDLES 2 MILLION ORDERS EVERYDAY IN 260 CITIES ACROSS CHINA
Dianping counts more that 190 million monthly active users in 2,300 cities
IN FEB. 2014, TENCENT ACQUIRED 20% OF DIANPING
AND THE SERVICE WAS QUICKLY INCORPORATED INTO WECHAT INTERFACE
To what extent do food practices, dealing with computerized media, weave the texture of everyday life in contemporary China?
INQUIRY INTO DIGITAL DIETS
from Old French diete (noun), dieter (verb), via Latin from Greek,
diata originally meant a ‘way of life’.
日常生活批判理论
Henri Lefebvre
(16 June 1901 – 29 June 1991) was a French Marxist, philosopher and sociologist, best known for pioneering the critique of everyday life, for introducing the concepts of the right to the city and the production of social space. Henri Lefebvre wrote more than 60 books and 300 articles.
from Field-Work to Wield-Fork
A CONSISTENT EQUIPMENT
FOR CHANGING SITUATIONS
SENSORY
OBSERVATION
> diachronic >
1-week long Immersing
into Domestic Spaces
COMMENSAL
ENGAGEMENT
/ synchronic /
Sharing Tables, Meals, and "Moments"
CURATORIAL
DESIGN
- asynchronic -
Collaborative Edition of Subjective Portray
First Adjustments
EVOLVING METHODOLOGY IN DIALOGIC CONTEXTS
Researcher Being Researched
PROGRESSIVE ARCHIVING OF MEDIA TRACES
The second day after having met Y. in the mini-bus from Taipo station we had another chat and came into the conversation the possibility of having her cooking for us, since it is her practice for certain guests she received via Airbnb.
As we agreed on a date she explained that she was also doing her own “little project” as she called it, writing the different life stories brought to us by the many travelers who came to her house since February after she registered her accommodation on the website.
Progressively, I started to consider different ways of presenting my research methodology to Y. by suggesting her to be my first participant for a pilot and experimental version of my study. She agreed with joy. This was without me realizing that Y. had already started examining and creating narratives about my own presence.
Naturally Unfolding Wield-Fork
LOOKING AT AND BEYOND THE FRAME
Among the notable occasions of commensality, Y. cooked for us an excellent vegetarian ramen. She insisted on making the dish “vegan” to show that one can display cooking creativity with resorting to meat as she explained to me later.
She showed me the stock she used for the soup but complained that this explicitly “non-chicken broth” tasted a bit too sweet compared the one she was used to employ for her ramen.
I took pictures of the whole process of preparation and enjoyed listening to Y. explaining me her intention to promote “alternative lifestyle” among her Wechat circles, constituted for the most part of her primary school, high-school and university friends in China, like her in their forties.
Editorial Collaboration
PLAYING WITH NARRATIVE AND MEDIA REFLEXIVITY
During our last in-depth our interview, which included audio and video recording, I asked Y. to talk about her practices of Wechat by focusing specifically on the things she shared with her Wechat friends during the period of my stay.
It allowed me to gain a deeper understanding of Y. located practice, understanding for example how she likes to write at night before sleeping to leave a little breakfast present to Chinese friends who usually fall asleep way earlier than her.
Rhythms naturally became an important point of discussion during the interview. And in many occasionS, Y. insisted that for her “food was life itself" and therefore was a way to share a "bit of her mood”, “creativity”, “love for art” with her friends every day.
ENTERING MEDIATIONS OF HOSPITALITY
- Share the domestic spaces of my participants under the regulations of online platforms
- Disclose my research intention from the first contact
- 1-week long stay from Monday to Monday
ADDRESSING THE SOCIAL FILTERING
- Test Methodology across 4 weeks of exploration in Shanghai
- Diversify the entry points by using different social platforms (Airbnb, Couchsurfing, XiaoZhu...)
- Leverage personal network in Shanghai to increase social diversity (social categories, age groups, etc.)
IDENTIFYING CRITICAL BIASES
- Laowai in China?
- Negotiated Observation
- Over-performance and demonstration
