ABSTRACT
This chapter explores some of the most important aspects that have arisen in recent decades while looking into the changes in the context and meaning of the market halls and of food. The study of food identities can be attributed to the growing interest in food and eating and to the broader field of consumer patterns as an instrument of social differentiation and identity building. The relationship between the recovery of traditional Catalan cuisine and the renovation of Barcelona's network of market halls is particularly significant. These are two processes that, while apparently reflecting different independent logics in terms of both their objectives and their social agents, are doubtless reactions to the globalization process that had been associated with the fast food industry until the end of the 1970s. The relationship between market policies and the various initiatives involving food identities shows a by no means accidental convergence resulting from a common network of issues and meanings.
