NOTE: The Paper #3 assignment is in the post BELOW this one, in case you missed class on Thursday (or lost it)
ALSO: You can skip Chapter 5, "Secular Church," since it's less important to our paper assignment. Read if it you like, but I won't hold you accountable for it.
Answer two of the following for Chapter 6:
Q1: What does the word "proselytizing" mean? How does this relate to food and diets? Why can we talk about food (such as "Gluten is the new Satan") in almost Biblical, and apocalyptic, terms?
Q2: How has the 'conversation' about dieting changed over the centuries, especially from the 1800s to the present? What 'science' has been proven wrong, and what new innovations/discoveries might be equally unsound? Related to this, why might it be useful to know the history of dieting to understand the present state of losing weight (and its future)?
Q3: Why might it be easier for diet fads and theories to take root today than say, 50 years ago? And similarly, why is it even harder to today to establish which ones are based in sound scientific fact and which ones are nonsense? Consider that "in 2014 alone, the FDA recalled seven faulty weight-loss products, issued over thirty public notifications and other warning letters, and even sent some people to jail for peddling illegal diet products" (173).
Q4: Quoting Harry Balzer, an expert on food and diet trends, Egan writes, "Food is fashion...we wear our food like we wear our clothes" (184). What do you think this means practically? How can we 'wear' food, and how can it inform and perform our identity?
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