The Gastronomy of Christmas: There is more here on social aspects than tinselism

Sunday 23 November 2008

There is more here on social aspects than tinselism

This page is to help you towards the spirit of Christmas.

Do you remember this picture from the "Welcome" page?
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If you have arrived from outer space, a trip to that page is advised. See link on the left.

If you would rather see tinsel first then click the log cabin link on the left. It is part of the Christmas we think we could have had if it were not for commercialism.

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The Gastronomy of Christmas

It is not the intention yet to delve into the food etc customs relating to Christmas. A quick look at a log cabin cake, or Yuletide via the links above left is permitted (!)

However, what we do at that time depends on our culture. Some sub-cultures within western society do not embrace it.

Those which do take it for granted divide into further sub-groups. Perhaps the simplest divisions are based on social class. The descriptive division is simple, defining them is less so.

We will look at them further on. For the moment we will use the every-day sets:

Upper-class

Middle-class

Lower-class

They are not my sets, it's how some in western society see them. When you are up a hill, you look down and vice versa. The same in society. In the Health Education and Food section of this website you are treated to professionals who stand at the top of the self-perceived hill. And others at the lower reaches of the social hill.

"The grouping of people together and according them status within society according to the groups they belong to, is as old as society itself."

That is from the Hewett site we look at later.

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Remember the Big Mac picture on the Health Education page? It could have been used again to illustrate that any fight against food-crime needs to continue on the 25th of December.

We need only one ‘reference’ to find the answer to

“Are there any fast food places like McDonalds Subway open on Christmas Day?”

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071218074557AAYipHX

The answers found within this chat-room are as varied as they are interesting.

Elsewhere, we can look at the factors involved in proper research into finding answers to questions within Gastronomy. The questions are different in kind from the one posed above.

The reader was spared the inevitable picture of a Christmas tree in the top left corner of the page. Does anyone have a picture of a bowler hat with holly in the band?

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A quick look at a system of social categories might be useful to introduce social class formally into the debate. It is the Hewett site mentioned previously.

http://www.hewett.norfolk.sch.uk/curric/soc/class/reg.htm

The groups in the first box need not detain us. The new system is not going to be useful at the present stage so move down to the ABC1 Scale. There are six classifications within five groups.

They are:

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"GROUP A -

Professional Workers (lawyers, doctors etc.), Scientists, Managers of large scale organisations.

GROUP B -
Shopkeepers, Farmers, Teachers, White-Collar workers.

GROUP C -
1. Skilled Manual (i.e. hand) workers - high grade e.g. Master Builders, Carpenters, Shop Assistants, Nurses.
2. Skilled Manual - low grade e.g. electricians, plumbers.

GROUP D -
Semi-Skilled Manual e.g. bus drivers, lorry drivers, fitters.

GROUP E -

Unskilled Manual e.g. general labourers, barmen, porters."

If this is new to you, where do you fit in the box?

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Gastronomy observes - it does not condemn. However, accusing the burger providers of criminality obviously reveals a viewpoint based on nutrition as much as anything else.

There are specialists who are interested in finding out about the eating etc behaviour of people. They include those in marketing looking for information on who buys what.

Other specialists may be looking at town planning and making decisions about where, how many shops, restaurants etc are needed in a specific location.

Yet others might attempt to assess changes in specific behaviour over a period of time – then and now, maybe.

Click the Surrey University link and go to No 2 on the list. There you can see just one way answers may be found.

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The essential text is:

"Biographers, historians and literary scholars have long considered diary documents to be of major importance for telling history. More recently, sociologists have taken seriously the idea of using personal documents to construct pictures of social reality from the actors' perspective ... .

"In contrast to these 'journal' type of accounts, diaries are used as research instruments to collect detailed information about behaviour, events and other aspects of individuals' daily lives."

http://sru.soc.surrey.ac.uk/SRU2.html

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You might think of that when you write –

“Went to MacDonald’s today.”

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in your diary.

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Who buys what and what they do with it in the kitchen and on the table, is more within “Food Aspects” elsewhere. We are looking at aspects of the social considerations relating to Christmas.

If a person’s Christmas lunch at home is a burger, holly and chips, is it transferred to a plate on this special occasion? Does the plate rest on a table? Is any cutlery used? Which is more likely, wine or beer to go with it?

What does Gastronomy offer?

“The lessons of gastronomy need to promote how to taste, how to savor the whole dining experience, whether it is a family meal at home or a special dining-out event.

"Unfortunately in later times, the tendency to judge food solely by what it looks like has increased. Almost everywhere in the modern world taste and aroma are demoted in favor of stylistic architecture, people no longer savor and appreciate the joy and satisfaction of eating and the entertaining and pleasant conversations over the dinner table seem to have disappeared entirely.”

You have already seen “Gastronomy – a Fine Art” by Ioan Margineanu and this excerpt raises questions about the burger dining experience in the context of the family meal.

The writer may assert that pleasant conversations over whatever form the dinner table takes in the Christmas-burger situation have disappeared. However, you only need to go in one of these outlets to hear that there is plenty of chat. Who will assess its quality and by what criteria?

The overall assertion relating to demotion of the meal experience needs investigation. I will leave that to later and anyone with conclusions just please send them in via this link -

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avrf23@dsl.pipex.com

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If I were to assert that burger-man’s main aim at Christmas doesn’t vary too much from a residual aim to get drunk, it would be necessary to provide evidence. Scribbled notes in a diary in this situation may be difficult to read. For the time being, suffice it to say that some, probably in a different ABC1 classification, would claim that evidence is not needed.

That does not further the purpose of Gastronomy if it claims to be a subject of study. Perhaps those in Group A - Professional Workers ... , Scientists, Managers ... would raise their glasses on Christmas Day and say that they drink to that – in Champagne.

To be continued

The class of three

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0DUsGSMwZY