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This book analyses the interaction between food, self-conceptions and region using three thematic streams: Food and Region, Food and the Imagination, and Alienation and the Handling of Food. It reflects on important questions concerning the impact on our lives of places of food production in an increasingly industrialised and globalised world.

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This book explores the relation between food production and place. Food production has traditionally shaped the character and self-conceptions of regions giving rise to a recognised linkage between certain foods and geographical areas. In the age of globalisation, it is inevitable that global food production will affect regional foods and eating habits. The contributors ask whether this also has a bearing on regions´ self-identity. Although industrialisation has had a major impact on food availability, food safety, and eating habits, industrially-produced food is increasingly regarded as "unhealthy food" in contrast to local food which is seen as being "good for the body". The volume includes discussions about how consumers deal with perceived risks associated with industrial production. They uncover a sense of alienation engendered by the invisibility of food production and food management processes and furthermore reflect on the notion of "hidden ingredients" which might influence consumers´ imagination about food and food production in general.

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Food and Region - Food and the Imagination - Alienation and the Handling of Food.

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Silke Bartsch is Professor for Nutrition, Home Economics and Specialised Didactics at the University of Education Karlsruhe, Germany. She studied home economics and biology at the Technische Universität Berlin and earned her PhD degree at the University of Education Heidelberg. Her research interests focus on eating behaviour and nutrition and consumer education.

Patricia Lysaght is em. Professor of European Ethnology at University College Dublin, Ireland. She has written extensively on many aspects of European ethnology and folklore. She is President of the International Commission for Ethnological Food Research, a Chair of the SIEF Working Group on Food Research, and contributing editor of many of the associated international conference publications.

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