Obesity
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Review of The Omnivore’s Dilemma
Review of The Omnivore’s Dilemma
Have you ever thought about corn? Where does it come from? What can we do with? Well in the book The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals is a nonfiction book by Michael Pollan published in 2006, in which Pollan asks the seemingly straightforward question of what we should have for dinner. As omnivores, we humans are faced with a wide variety of food choices, resulting in a dilemma. To find out about those choices, Pollan follows each of the food chains that sustain us, industrial food, organic food, and food we forage ourselves, from the source to a final meal, and in the process writes an account of the American way of eating. Pollan talks all about it in part I: Industrial/Corn (P. 15-119) chapters 1, 2 and 3. In these three chapters we will review “The Planet”, “The Farm” and “The Elevators”.
Pollan begins with an exploration of the food-production system from which the vast majority of American meals are derived. This industrial food chain is largely based on corn, whether it is eaten directly, fed to livestock, or processed into chemicals such as glucose, often in the form of high-fructose corn syrup, and ethanol. Pollan discusses how the corn plant came to dominate the American diet through a combination of biological, cultural, and political factors. He visits George Naylor's corn farm in Iowa to learn more about those factors. The role of petroleum in the cultivation and transportation of the American food supply is also discussed. In “The Farm,” Pollan tells the story of George Naylor, a corn farmer from Iowa, to illustrate the impact that corporate industry, government policy, and technological innovation have on the production of corn. He discovers that corn is being grossly overproduced—to the detriment of the American farmer but to the benefit of corporations and grain exporters. Ironically, it has come to the point that it costs a dollar more to produce corn than...
Review of The Omnivore’s Dilemma
Have you ever thought about corn? Where does it come from? What can we do with? Well in the book The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals is a nonfiction book by Michael Pollan published in 2006, in which Pollan asks the seemingly straightforward question of what we should have for dinner. As omnivores, we humans are faced with a wide variety of food choices, resulting in a dilemma. To find out about those choices, Pollan follows each of the food chains that sustain us, industrial food, organic food, and food we forage ourselves, from the source to a final meal, and in the process writes an account of the American way of eating. Pollan talks all about it in part I: Industrial/Corn (P. 15-119) chapters 1, 2 and 3. In these three chapters we will review “The Planet”, “The Farm” and “The Elevators”.
Pollan begins with an exploration of the food-production system from which the vast majority of American meals are derived. This industrial food chain is largely based on corn, whether it is eaten directly, fed to livestock, or processed into chemicals such as glucose, often in the form of high-fructose corn syrup, and ethanol. Pollan discusses how the corn plant came to dominate the American diet through a combination of biological, cultural, and political factors. He visits George Naylor's corn farm in Iowa to learn more about those factors. The role of petroleum in the cultivation and transportation of the American food supply is also discussed. In “The Farm,” Pollan tells the story of George Naylor, a corn farmer from Iowa, to illustrate the impact that corporate industry, government policy, and technological innovation have on the production of corn. He discovers that corn is being grossly overproduced—to the detriment of the American farmer but to the benefit of corporations and grain exporters. Ironically, it has come to the point that it costs a dollar more to produce corn than...