by Alex V. Barnard - £20.99 University of Minnesota Press (2016)
paperback
ISBN 13: 9780816698134 | ISBN 10: 0816698139
Freegans, who try to live on what we throw away, reveal the limits of capitalism but also the limits of consumer activism in changing it.
Freegans is a close look at people who live on what capitalism throws away — including food culled from supermarket dumpsters. Through several years of fieldwork and in-depth interviews in New York City, Alex Barnard has created a portrait of freegans that leads to questions about ethical consumption — like buying organic, fair trade, or vegan — and the search for effective forms of action in an era of political disillusionment.
"Eat this book. If you’re lucky enough to find it in the trash, dig it out and bite in. It’s sociologically fresh and environmentally nutritious. Alex V. Barnard writes crisply and invitingly, and his analysis of the ‘fetishism of waste’ is novel and helpful. This is ethnography as it is meant to be: going through the trash and thrash of everyday life and uncovering analytic treasures — free to be had, if we only stop to look. "
(Michael Bell, University of Wisconsin-Madison )
(Price & availability last checked: July 2016)
In booklists: Food Industry and the Politics of Food,
In categories: Anti-Capitalism & Global Inequality, Food & Cooking,
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