Food Media and Cultures

Located within the Cultures of the Everyday research cluster in the Communications, Culture and Media team, this research grouping is comprised of Dr Joanne Hollows, Dr Steve Jones and Dr Ben Taylor who have a longstanding interest in a wide range of aspects of food media and cultures. This dates back to our collaboration on the book Food and Cultural Studies (Routledge, 2004).

We have published widely on questions of class and gender in television cookery programmes including work on Nigella Lawson, Jamie Oliver, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and the campaigning culinary documentary. Within this work we have also addressed the relationships between food and neoliberalism; feminism; lifestyle; and ethical consumption.

Another focus has been food writing and journalism and, in particular, the work of Jane Grigson, Elizabeth David and Nigel Slater. Although we continue to work in these areas, we have also recently published on the relationship between food and cultural policy, focusing on the role of urban food festivals. We welcome PhD students who share our interests in food media and culture.

J. Hollows, S. Jones and B. Taylor (2013), Making Sense of Urban Food Festivals: cultural regeneration, disorder and hospitable cities, Journal of Policy Research in Tourism, Leisure and Events. Available at the Taylor and Francis website.

J. Hollows (2013), Spare Rib, Second-wave Feminism and the Politics of Consumption, Feminist Media Studies, 13(3). DOI: 10.1080/14680777.2012.708508

S. Jones and B. Taylor (2012), Food Journalism, in B. Turner and R. Orange, eds, Specialist Journalism, Routledge.

D. Bell and J. Hollows (2011), From 'River Cottage' to 'Chicken Run': Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and the class politics of ethical consumption. Celebrity Studies, 2 (2), pp. 178-191.

J. Hollows and S. Jones (2010) ‘Please Don’t Try This at Home’: Heston Blumenthal, Cookery TV and the Culinary Field, Food Culture and Society, 13(4): 521-37.

J. Hollows and S. Jones (2010), ‘At Least He’s Doing Something': Moral Entrepreneurship and Individual Responsibility in Jamie’s Ministry of Food, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 13 (3): 307-22

• The campaigning culinary documentary
  Building on earlier research on TV series such as Jamie's Ministry of Food, Joanne Hollows and Steve Jones continue to explore the political implications of this relatively recent format to examine how relations between 'ordinary people', government and the food industry are negotiated in contemporary culture (Joanne Hollows and Steve Jones).
• The Politics of Food Consumption in Second-wave Feminism
  Part of a wider project which examines how second-wave feminists used consumption practices as a site of politics, this research analyses feminist periodicals of the late 1960s and the 1970s to examine how food consumption practices were used to articulate a range of political positions around gender and class inequality (Joanne Hollows).