In this provocative and lively addition to his acclaimed writings on food, Warren Belasco takes a sweeping look at a little-explored yet timely topic: humanity's deep-rooted anxiety about the future of food. People have expressed their worries about the future of the food supply in myriad ways, and here Belasco explores a fascinating array of material ranging over two hundred years--from futuristic novels and films to world's fairs, Disney amusement parks, supermarket and restaurant architecture, organic farmers' markets, debates over genetic engineering, and more. Placing food issues in this deep historical context, he provides an innovative framework for understanding the future of food today--when new prophets warn us against complacency at the same time that new technologies offer promising solutions. But will our grandchildren's grandchildren enjoy the cornucopian bounty most of us take for granted? This first history of the future to put food at the center of the story provides an intriguing perspective on this question for anyone--from general readers to policy analysts, historians, and students of the future--who has wondered about the future of life's most basic requirement.
First off, let me say that this book is not just a dry, dusty, tome of facts and figures. This is a funny, common sense filled book about the future of food, starting with a two hundred plus history of how mankind saw food. What would we eat? Would we have enough? Should we give up meat? After this foundation the author, Warren Belasco, slips us into the places and people who have shaped our ideas of future food. World fairs, Walt Disney, futurists, science fiction writers, businesses, car companies, and so on. This is really an enjoyable book. Yet it also asks us some serious questions about the future and where food is place in it. Do we want meat? Do we want food pills? Do we want to have any say in what it tastes like? Anybody who enjoys history or science fiction or future history needs this book!
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