Eat Food: Food Defined By Michael Pollan

It is a known fact that every human being communicates through language, but perhaps a little known fact that we communicate even through the food we eat. We communicate through food all the meanings that we assign and attribute to our culture, and consequently to our identity as well. Food is not only nourishment for our bodies, but a symbol of where we come from. In order to understand the basic function of food as a necessity not only for our survival, we must look to politics, power, identity, and culture.

Neither life nor culture can be sustained without food. On a very basic level, food is fundamentally essential for life, not simply to exist, but also to thrive. A means by which carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, nutrients, and calories are introduced into the body, food is a mechanism of survival. However, on a more abstract level, food is also fundamentally essential for culture by establishing its perimeters and dimensions and in shaping its authenticity and character. Food becomes the

A bread is no longer an original bread but a mixture of chemicals. Most products out in the market are not food, and people should choose wisely on what they put in their mouth. It is important for people to eat healthy food and keep their immune system strong. People these days bought food that is cheap and available to them. They have to choices to eat healthy yet it is hard to control themselves against something that is convenient, low cost, and predictable. The article “Eat Food: Food Defined,” written by Michael Pollan, explains what kinds of food people should eat. Based on his explanations the only food are those capable of rotting, less than 5 ingrdients and with pronumbacble ingrdeients. He also said we should not go to the supermarket nor buy can food but to buy fresh food from farmer’s market. His ideas of eating food is push toward the healthy side, and it is a great start for people to understand, to learn and to progress in eating healthily.

In Michael Pollan’s essay, “The American Paradox”, Pollan argues that American’s hold falsified ideas if one is more focused on nutrition. Americans have too much going on in their head with trying to be healthy, that they do not actually become healthy. The notion that “a notably unhealthy population preoccupied with nutrition and the idea of eating healthy” (Pollan 268) is what Pollan defines as the “American paradox”. The amount of time spent focusing on healthy eating habits decreases the joy one contains. Pollan identifies many issues that contribute to what is wrong with the way Americans think about eating today. For instance, we spend too much time and money trying to be healthy, we have strayed away from the past as new inventions occurred and last being we listen to “flawed science”. Despite the fact that many may say they see positive results from focusing on nutrition and health, Americans actually receive negative outcomes from nutrition and health.

The essay “Eat Food: Food Defined,” from Michael Pollan’s 2008 book In Defense of Food was written to address the American general public about the food industry. Pollan focuses on relatable topics as examples, such as family, common food items, and common belief that everyone wants to be healthy. The essay brings across Pollan’s point by establishing his credibility, explaining why this is important to us, and telling us how to react to the given facts. Pollan makes the readers inquire how we define food by drawing our attention to the importance of examining our food before eating it.

When it comes to food in today's day and age it correlates with being convenient, fast, and budgeting because people are usually on the go. Generally, people are used to a grab and go routine between work, school, and a family life. Government regulations such as the FDA and other laws given to factories and supermarkets are being trusted to keep the population safe from any food dangerous; therefore, people don’t do their own research on the foods they’re serving. Authors Pollan and Schlosser in Food Matters, allows individuals to analyze and think about the intake of foods used in their daily life. Pollan shares some rules to be considered when shopping for foods in the supermarket. If people read in detail the theories and information given

Michael Moss, an investigative reporter who enjoys reporting on food, wrote: “The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food” (pages 471-494). This article reports on the ways that prepackaged food, especially junk food, is being designed to fit the customers’ needs and wants, as well as being something that the body craves. Moss provides multiple accounts throughout the reading in which people who have worked for or created corporate companies design foods just so they will sell. Moss expresses his thought in a clear manner to the reader so he or she will understand that Moss worries about the growing obesity in America and places the blame on junk food corporations. Though junk food corporations have a great part in the growing obesity,

In his book " In Defense of Food " author Michael Pollan takes an interesting and thought

Take a gander around your local mega-mart today, and what do you see? An epidemic of food like substances taking over the supermarket shelves; an epidemic that has substituted real food for fake, shown links to obesity, and has altered our eating habits. There is, however, a solution that allows you to stick to the healthy foods you want to eat and avoid the foods you don’t.

David H. Freedman, a consulting editor for John Hopkins and author of several books, writes in “How Junk food can End Obesity” about the dangers of ruling out Fast Food as a way to decrease obesity in society. He argues that using nutrients to gauge the healthiness of a food is an adequate way to increase health in society, and that most “healthy” foods contain a lot of unhealthy ingredients that do not promote health. He also advocates small changes of about 50-100 calories in meals to encourage people to stay on their diets and promote long-term weight loss. He also points out the severe monetary difference between health foods and fast food. He ultimately wants to promote using the forum of food in society to decrease obesity in society, rather than making the large leap from junk food to whole, natural foods.

As well as providing nutritional value food and drink also play a significant role in culture and rituals. For

The question of how to eat well, while maintaining good health has always been a big worry for Americans. The two articles I've reference call my gift to vastly opposing views all what "eating healthy "means and how we should be done. Wow pollan says that One should avoid processed foods and not over eat, Macksville points out that not eating is also Phaedo in that peoples will be able to eat healthy on their own given the chance. I have my own view on the debate that will probably be somewhere in the middle that you can probably can be done through many ways, and that one's health can be maintain and a variety of methods.

In 2009 food detective Michael Pollan published an eye-opening book called The Omnivore’s Dilemma. According to Pollan, we don’t know what to eat because unlike other cultures around the world, Americans lack a stable food culture. Food cultures are traditions that are passed down from generation to generation to teach us how to cook and eat food. These cultures can help you stay healthy and more importantly, enjoy your food.

How does one define a term as large as food? Is it the substance that we place within our mouths to sate a basic necessity or a pleasure that one can indulge in given the opportunity? Well, that’s the glory behind the concept of food. To put it another way, food is quite frankly an abstraction given physical form. There really isn’t a proper way to define food because it comes and goes in terms of substance throughout one’s life span. Not only is it tied to a lifespan of ever changing alterations to the definition, but it’s also engrained within each and every individual differently. The book, Food Matters (Bauer), covers a few wide topics that correlate directly with this idea and as such will be mentioned throughout the course of this

“The consumption of food, which literally becomes a part of our body, is saturated with meanings and symbolisms.”1 It is therefore important for us to find out the special meanings behind the food that we so take for granted, in order to understand the reasons for eating it, and pass these rituals onto our future generations.