Reading Guide:
The University of Oregon encourages readers to engage the text critically and suggests the following questions to consider:
1. Michael Pollan approaches eating as a profoundly ethical act. Do you agree that deciding what’s for dinner is the moral dilemma he argues it is? What questions most concern you about the way we eat and the way our food is produced?
2. Some critics have argued that Pollan doesn’t go far enough in his advice— for example, by not insisting that all readers become vegetarians. Do you feel that any of Pollan’s ethical positions are too radical, or not radical enough? Why?
3. Pollan argues that food is as much a matter of culture as of science. In what ways are you what you eat?
4. What do you think American eating habits reveal about our national character? How is Pollan’s book not only about healthful eating, but also about cultural values?
5. Pollan writes, “For the majority of Americans, spending more for better food is less a matter of ability than priority” (187). If America values food that is fast, cheap, and easy, what does that say about our socioeconomic priorities? What about people for whom access to healthy food is not a problem of priority, but of affordability?
6. In Defense of Food describes several instances in which government policies seem to have worsened the crisis in our food culture. In your view, what is government’s proper role in deciding how our food is produced, processed, and consumed?
7. Pollan critiques scientific preoccupation with what he calls the “ideology of nutritionism” (52) at the expense of a traditional cultural or ecological understanding of health. He writes, “We’ll know this has changed when doctors kick the fast-food franchises out of the hospitals” (142). What contradictions do you see in the science and marketing of food?
8. Pollan writes that food “comprises a set of social and ecological relationships, reaching back to the land and outward to other people” (144). What are these relationships, and how might changing the way we eat change other things?
9. The final chapters of In Defense of Food offer a few food rules: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants” (146) whose seeming simplicity belies the complex reasoning behind them. Which of Pollan’s arguments do you find the most or least convincing, and which of his rules, if any, might you consider adopting?
10. If you could have Michael Pollan over for dinner, what would you serve him? What would you talk about? How has this book changed the way you think about food, or informed the choices you make?
11.Michael Pollan has been criticized for not focusing on the economic reality of our nation’s poor and underrepresented communities. What would you ask him about his plans to increase food equity in the U.S.?
12.The portrayal of our nation’s farmers in the book is that most use pesticides and herbicides freely, with more concern for profitability than health. Do you think this is a fair portrayal of the farming community?
13.Organic and small scale farms are often begun by people who have other occupations and can afford to have a “hobby” farm that produces very little income. Does his praise of small farms affect the relevance of his message?
14.In a push to promote “localvore” eating habits, is he disregarding the limits of people who live in impoverished inner city areas, and those who have limited access to fresh produce?
15. Michael Pollan romanticizes a time when food was minimally processed and food preparation was an important part of our food culture. The food industry has freed women from the burden of arduous food preparation; does his view of the food industry avoid the important context in the history of opportunities for women outside the home?
Comment Guide:
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One of the primary predicates of our national culture is efficiency; we see fast-paced instant gratification being advanced in nearly every sector, food and nutrition being no exception. As Pollan points out, the evolution of our food culture towards instant gratification with minimized costs both fiscally and temporally has been directly correlated with the rise of obesity in the United States. Thus, Pollan rightly assumes that in order to comprehensively address the subject of nutrition, one must consider not only the physical “what” we eat but also the cultural values of how and why we eat. He does this by contrasting the Western diet’s norms of snacking, solitary meals, rapidity of consumption, and sources for food with the proven methods of traditional diets.
Perhaps I would have taken his book more seriously if he would have been more moderate when he talked about science and nutrionism. He basically says that science is worthless when it comes to telling you to eat better things, and that in many cases, it is even harmful. Yet, he has random exceptions throughout the book, such as his advice to not take supplements… except for omega 3s and multivitamins. Take those ones… those are good.
His argument would have been more valid, in my opinion, if he simply told us to be skeptical of the prevailing food or diet fad, for lack of a better word. Instead, he told us not to believe science at all because it’s lying to us and making our food unhealthy.
The half of his argument that I did agree with was simply pragmatic blabbering. Of course we should eat in proper servings and have a varied diet! It was like he was trying to validify his more radical claims with obvious statements so that people would believe both of them automatically.
Also, I couldn’t tell if he was trying to write a book for the typical American or for scholars. If he was writing the book with the intended audience of the typical American, he probably could have cut back on a lot of things. If he was writing it as a scientific argument, a thesis persay, then he failed. He should have supported his claims more deeply, instead of just citing some study and writing a paragraph or two and then moving on to the next claim.
Basically, I think that he was writing the book for people who want to change their diet. As someone who was skeptical about his advice when I started the book, I can say that he completely failed to PROVE to me to change my diet.
John, I completely agree with you. I believe Pollan’s book was a lot of fluff. It was as if he wasjust trying to fill the pages with words. A lot of the stuff he wrote about could be filed under common sense; despite the fact that he kept trying to say that most Americans didn’t have all of this knowledge about food in the first places. It’s not that we don’t know, honestly, it’s that we don’t care. I agree in that he has very many contradictions to himself. He should have, from the get-go, explained that he wasn’t completely against the reductionist way of thinking about food, because as you said, he does promote taking supplements. It seemed like he was trying to prove himself as an elite researcher and not giving enough depth as to what his opinion was and WHY he thought that way. Sure, he had facts and studies to back him up, but it call came down to: so freaking what? I think he lacked the determination to really get down to the nitty gritty and try to persuade people to change their diets. He basically threw a whole bunch of facts at us, tied in with his own (attempted) wit, and expected us to just go with the flow and praise him for the food genius he is.
I don’t think I would have picked up this book by myself, and I don’t think it served its purpose. Whatever that purpose was, because I really don’t know what it was since it kept changing throughout the chapters.
“It’s not that we don’t know, honestly, it’s that we don’t care.”
As one of the few that does care, I wholeheartedly agree. I went to a high school with an off-campus lunch, which basically resulted in everyone going to McDonald’s, Burger King, or the local pizza place. They knew exactly what they were doing, but it didn’t bother them. In my upper middle class neighborhood, healthy food is available and affordable, yet my friends typically didn’t choose a healthy option. Generally speaking, Americans don’t care, even while making an obviously bad decision. Like you, I probably would not have picked up this book by myself.
For the most part, I share your skepticism. Throughout the novel, his authority is a bit suspect. I was also curious about the composition of the intended audience. It appears as though we both noticed his somewhat pedestrian writing style, something not commonly found among Columbia grads. That implies that he is indeed writing for the common man, not for scholars. Scholars tend to be healthier anyway, so it makes sense if he is writing for typical Americans. It is interesting that we, as scholars, were asked to read a book that addresses a problem typically found outside of our demographic. I have always been very healthy, without Pollan’s diet, and I have no intentions of changing. Instead of adopting his diet, Americans simply need to find a healthy diet that works for them.
While he may or may not be writing for the “common man,” I think his general message actually is valuable to the health-obsessed. His base argument is that food is more than the sum of its parts. There are many people who don’t believe this central premise- whether it be believing that taking vitamins can substitute eating vegetables, or that food is not for enjoying but solely for survival or nutrition. Being overtly health-obsessed is becoming more and more popular. Though much of the book is common sense, and I believe he takes his critique of science too far, his general message can be valuable.
In general, my opinion of this book was low. Although Pollan brings up important modern issues concerning the way we eat (namely the corrupt relationship between scientists and our federal bureaucracy), I found the book as a whole rather repetitive and accusatory. I was particularly peeved by his repeated attack on scientists. Yes, I completely agree that science tends to jump the gun and display its findings before they are completely reliable (case and point – solar panels that are more expensive than they are profitable), however, I truly believe that most scientists have the public’s best interest at heart. It is not the nutritionists themselves that are evil, nor the reduction science itself, it is the corporations that seize shaky food findings and try to turn a profit before their methods are proven that are to blame. All in all, as a healthy eater myself, I found that this book was much less of an informational “manifesto” than it was a didactic rant on common sense.
It seems always possible to find an article on the web that shines a new or different light on the world. I felt that your article did just that and while I agree that eating food should be as much a social event/statement as sustinance, I do wonder where society is going when so many adults don’t even appreciate where lamb comes from. That’s all. Thanks.