Insatiable Appetite: Food As Cultural Signifier In The Middle East And Beyond

Description

Edited by Dmitriev, Kirill; Edited by Hauser Julia; Edited by Orfali Bilal

Short /annotation:
Insatiable Appetite: Food as Cultural Signifier in the Middle East and Beyond explores the cultural ramifications of food and foodways in the Mediterranean and Arab-Muslim countries.

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Insatiable Appetite: Food as Cultural Signifier in the Middle East and Beyond explores the cultural ramifications of food and foodways in the Mediterranean, and Arab-Muslim countries in particular. The volume addresses the cultural meanings of food from a wider chronological scope,from antiquity to present, adopting approaches from various disciplines, including classical Greek philology, Arabic literature, Islamic studies, anthropology, and history. The contributions to the book are structured around six thematic parts, ranging in focus from social status to religious prohibitions, gender issues, intoxicants, vegetarianism, and management of scarcity.

Contributors are: Tarek Abu Hussein, Yasmin Amin, Kevin Blankinship, Tylor Brand, Kirill Dmitriev, Eric Dursteler, Anny Gaul, Julia Hauser, Christian Junge, Danilo Marino, Pedro Martins, Karen Moukheiber, Christian Saßmannshausen, Shaheed Tayob, and Lola Wilhelm.

Table of contents:
Notes on ContributorsIntroductionPart 1Food and Social StatusSocial Dining, Banqueting, and the Cultivation of a Coherent Social IdentityThe Case of Damascene ʿUlamaʾ in the Late Mamluk and Early Ottoman PeriodTarek Abu HusseinEating UpFood Consumption and Social Status in Late Ottoman Greater SyriaChristian SaßmannshausePart 2Prohibitions and Prescriptions from Classical Islam to the PresentPeeling Onions, Layer by LayerA Journey with Two Bulbs through the Islamicate World and Its LiteratureYasmin AminBeyond ḤalālThe Dos and Don’ts of Syrian Medieval Cookery in a Twelfth-Century Market Inspector ManualKaren MoukheiberMolecular HalalProducing, Debating, and Evading Halal Certification in South AfricaShaheed TayobPart 3Food, Gender, and the Body in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth CenturiesFood, Happiness, and the Egyptian Kitchen (1900–1952)Anny GaulFood, Body, Societyal-Shidyāq’s Somatic Experience of Nineteenth-Century CommunitiesChristian JungePart 4Intoxication: Wine and Hashish in Literary Sources and BeyondThe Symbolism of Wine in Early Arabic Love PoetryObservations on the Poetry of Abū Ṣakhr al-HudhalīKirill DmitrievHashish and FoodArabic and European Medieval Dreams of Edible ParadisesDanilo MarinoThe “Abominable Pig” and the “Mother of All Vices”Pork, Wine, and the Culinary Clash of Civilizations in the Early Modern MediterraneanEric DurstelerPart 5Abstention: Vegetarianism in the Mediterranean and Europe from Antiquity to the Nineteenth CenturyAn Ontological Dispute in the Writings of Porphyry of TyreThe Discussion of Meat Eating as a Battlefield for Competing Worldviews in AntiquityPedro Ribeiro MartinsThe Missionary and the HereticDebating Veganism in the Medieval Islamic WorldKevin BlankinshipA Frugal CrescentPerceptions of Foodways in the Ottoman Empire and Egypt in Nineteenth-Century Vegetarian DiscourseJulia HauserPart 6Managing Scarcity in the Nineteenth and Twentieth CenturiesSome Eat to Remember, Some to ForgetStarving, Eating, and Coping in the Syrian Famine of World War ITylor BrandLocal Histories of International Food-Aid Policies from the Interwar Period to the 1960sThe World Food Programme in the Middle EastLola WilhelmIndex

Review quote:
“This text ultimately excels in approaching an often misunderstood region from a novel perspective, providing fresh insights into old questions, and is recommended for scholars and graduate students working on the history or anthropology of food, or interested in alternative histories of the Medit