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Conclusion: The major historical process operating in
the food and farming sector is of Industrialisation. (I am in
particular studying the UK). This process began about a century
ago, and is still increasing. Although Industrialisation is a
'loaded word', I cannot see a better one to use.
Introduction: I have derived the above result from the
following pages, which I originally wrote to try to create a modern
"map" of food and farming. I have not re-written my
original text to 'prove' or demonstrate the conclusion about industrialisation.
There are the following sections:-
· The main changes in techniques in the last century
(begin here)
· The main types of business involved with farming and
food (begin here)
· The main types of campaigns involved with food, farming
and land use (begin here)
· The main official, government and international bodies
for farming and food (begin here)
· Some historic writings, and a very brief history (begin
here)
· Written influences on food and farming - gourmet writing,
advertising, children's books (begin
here)
· A summary and some other points of explanation. (begin
here)
Or, you could begin at 'the start
page' or at the complete index
The purpose of this is to try and establish a fair picture of
"Where we have come from, Who is involved, and What is written
about food and farming", and, in places, to give an idea
of what is possible in the future.
I have created about 60 (short) web pages - you can go to the
full index of these, or continually click NEXT at the top right
to go through them sequentially, or you could navigate via the
links at the bottom of each page. You could also get a fair impression
of the study by choosing to view one page from each section of
the index.
I have written this about Britain - no doubt other countries
are fairly similar.
My personal aim in this is to do the groundwork for my dissertation
- I am trying to get a clear picture of where we have come from
and what are the main influences in 'the whole field' of food
and agriculture. This is intended to provide a context for the
future stages of my project, which will involve the textual analysis
of some aspects of British Government food policy. In particular,
I am interested in the language of aims and objectives (I am also
recording these for the British Ministry on the Policy
Page). At the moment, I am much more interested in
'How do people think about food and farms, and how is this expressed
in the policies ?' rather than 'What are the effects of the policies
?' or 'How can we change them ?'.
I am trying to maintain impartiality with this topic, but I have
created :-
1. a summary page after the 'changes in technique' section
2. several pages with some tentative conclusions and some comments
on the patterns that have emerged,
3. I have also made a page of any assumptions that I am aware
of having made
4. I have added a page about my own position - I am trying to
be impartial, but this is not realistic, and I think it is only
fair to the reader to state my own position.
5. The study has a deliberately "flat" structure - I
want to be as neutral as I can, presenting the organisations just
as they present themselves using a "snapshot and paste"
technique. I make some comments on their language and approaches
in the Patterns page
You contributions, questions and improvements are welcomed !
Please email me at george@whatever-will.be
I have now also created a further
site on food, based on my dissertation on Discourse Analysis
of UK food policy, and I intend use any resonses to create further
mapping of opinions and to create new documents to extend understanding
of these subjects.
I am happy to correct any major errors, however, all the 'cut,
paste and link' sections I have created form a 'snapshot' of all
these organisations for the week of 4th-11th May, 2002. I would
probably not want to update these pages, though it would be interesting
to track any shifts and changes in their language ! The 'cut,
paste and link' sections are intended to give an idea of how these
organisations 'present themselves' to the world.
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