Food and Philosophy

The philosophy of food is an emerging field of contemporary philosophical scholarship, which distinguishes itself for its highly inter- and cross-disciplinary orientation as well as for the contamination of different schools and traditions of philosophy. Initially preoccupied with core issues concerning food ethics (e.g., vegetarianism and the ethics of agriculture) and food aesthetics (e.g., the nature of gustatory experience as well as its aesthetic value), the philosophy of food has since expanded to encompass a wide range of debates linked to food production, consumption, and representation. The list of topics includes, among others and in no particular order: food systems vis-à-vis climate change and environmental ethics; the ethics of dieting and obesity; food and cultural appropriation; questions concerning the identity of specific food items (e.g., natural foods, recipes, geographical indications); the aesthetic worth of specific beverages (among the most studied, wine, coffee, beer, whiskey); broad conceptions of food justice as found in local food movements, feminist approaches to the study of food, and social gastronomy. This list testifies not only to the broad spectrum of questions that philosophers have taken up, but also to the numerous methodologies that they have employed to address them.