ABSTRACT
Food is the most basic of aH social codes; basic not in the same sense as language, whose study serves as metaphor for the study of other codes, but basic in the sense of sheer survival utility. Humans use language for their psychological well-being, but they require food for their continued physical existence. Those who live in an industrial society tend to forget that obtaining food traditionally was and for many groups, still is the main goal of a day's work. That many in the modern world are able to take food for granted does not lessen its essential nature. Because of this ultimate significance, the study of food is "as material and pragmatic a field as one can get" (Firth, 1973a, p. 260)}
Food functions well as a cross-cultural topic of study due to the characteristic of being a common human requirement. Whereas universals are generally hard to come by in the social world, the sharing of food takes on a universal meaning of friendship and community, for all humans can be assumed to need food. 2 Yet there is a distinction to be drawn between need and preference. Despite the common need for food, a wide range of food preferences exists around the world; what one group values, another considers nonfood. Exarnples of foods eaten by sorne that are anathema to others range from insects to rotted wood garnished with honey (Gillen, 1944). As Mary Douglas, an anthropologist known particularly for her investigations of food, pointed out, "If biology were the basis for the selection of human foods, diets around the world would be quite similar. In fact, no human activity more puzzlingly crosses the divide between nature and culture than the selection of food. It is part of the nurture of the body, but it is also very much a social matter" (1979, p. 15).
