Dr. Yasmin Ibrahim, Queen Mary, University of London
Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of E-Politics (IJEP)
Food imaging is here to stay. With smartphones and mobile gadgets embedded with imaging and recording facilities, food as an everyday offering has become an object of personal statement and pleasure on social networking sites, specialist blogs and on image and video sharing platforms. No enjoyment of a cup of tea or fresh bowl of noodles is complete without an image of its immediacy. Food is meant to be shared – if not materially then at least symbolically through imagery and visual displays. We’ve become food flaneurs, generously offering food to friends and unknown others through imagery online. Food styling and photography, once the preserve of professionals, is now anyone’s game. Food imagery denoted the pleasure of spectacle, desire, and vicarious consumption akin to pornography.
Today food imaging has been re-appropriated by the masses on social networking sites, with wearable technologies and our need to create content non-stop. The image galleries online invite public spectacle with a stunning repository of food images. Food has universal appeal and yet is culturally shaped. Communication with and through images of food is an accepted part of sociability today. Food can be banal and pornographic but invariably has a value as an object of exchange online. Intense interest in amateur food photography and advancements in smart phone cameras and image resolution has made food imaging a part of everyday practice and ritual. Cups of coffee, cake, home dinners, and extraordinary feasts are consumed both bodily but more importantly communally through images. Food as a form of ephemeral consumption becomes preserved beyond its shelf life in the digital economy. Traded as a cultural artifact and exchanged as gifts between friends and strangers, food remains a highly symbolic form of cultural exchange today. Food porn online then denotes the implicit desire and pleasure contained in these compositions, where the gaze and aestheticization transform food from the banal to the unattainable. The phenomenon of food porn through the smartphone has raised much scrutiny about this ubiquitous practice. What makes us capture the cake and share it with others visually first before we eat it?
The Special issue on the E-Politics of Food from Online Campaigning to the Aesthetics of Food Porn in the International Journal of E-Politics, Volume 6, Issue 3, showcases select articles from online campaigning to the aesthetics of food porn. My article, “Food Porn and the Invitation to Gaze: Ephemeral Consumption and the Digital Spectacle” deconstructs the reasons why we image food, and traces the history of food porn in mainstream media, art history, and in our contemporary digital economy. Food as a vital part of culture, identity, belonging, and meaning celebrates both the everyday and the invitation to renew connections through food as a universal subject of appeal. Food imagery as a form of transacted materiality online offers familiarity, comfort, co-presence but above all a common elemental literacy where food transcends cultural barriers, offering a universal pull towards a commodity which is ephemeral yet preserved through the click economy. Food is symbolic of human solidarity, sociality, and sharing and equally of difference, creating a spectacle and platform for conversations, conventions, connections, and vicarious consumption. Food images symbolize connection at a distance through everyday material culture and practices. It’s not just cats which rule the Internet, food imagery is a close contender.
Some of IGI Global’s other publications on digital interaction and social media include the following:
All of the above research is featured in IGI Global’s InfoSci®-Journals database. Offered for an annual subscription (2000-2019) as low as US$ 5,350 (one time perpetual purchase for current volume year (2020) offered as low as US$ 5,450*, this database hosts key features such as full-text PDF and HTML format, no DRM, unlimited simultaneous users, and no embargo of content (research is available months in advance of the print release). Spanning across 350+ topics in 11 core subject areas, including business and management, computer science, education, government and law, social sciences and humanities, and more, this comprehensive research database is ideal for academic and research institutions.
Additionally, when a library invests in IGI Global's InfoSci-Journals database, IGI Global will match the library’s investment with a fund of equal value to go toward subsidizing the open access (OA) article processing charges (APCs) for their students, faculty, and staff at that institution when their work is submitted and accepted under OA into an IGI Global journal.**
Purchase or recommend this database to your institution’s librarian.
Due to IGI Global’s commitment to the highest quality and ethics (as we are an active full member of the Committee on Publication Ethics, "COPE"), this content will emphasize the most current and groundbreaking research results that has undergone a robust peer review and vetting process, ensuring the highest level of accuracy, quality, and integrity.
Newsroom Contact
Caroline Campbell
Marketing Manager
ccampbell@igi-global.com
(717) 533-8845, ext. 144
www.igi-global.com/