Food as faith: suffering, salvation and the Paleo diet in Australia

ABSTRACT

Dietary regimes are frequently likened to religious movements on account of the fervor of advocates’ adherence, and their enthusiastic proselytizing. Yet, beyond this somewhat pejorative use of the metaphor, analysis of the quasi-religious nature of diets can provide a valuable window into the subjective experiences of individuals undertaking stringent dietary regimes. Among Australian Paleo dieters, the increase in chronic illness and obesity prevalence is perceived as indicative of societal disorder, with the breakdown of the body reflecting broader economic, political and social malaise. The Paleo diet’s embedded moralism provides an explanatory apparatus that makes sense of the world through notions of good and evil, in this way satisfying dieters’ desires for cosmological meaning within their experiences of suffering. This moral symbolism filters into constructions of food as either pure or polluting, with “clean” eating and Paleo lifestyle transformations serving as quotidian expressions of agency, and a means of resistance to societal ills. The Paleo diet consequently exemplifies how the functions of traditional religion can be fulfilled by dietary practices within secular communities.

KEYWORDS:

• Paleo diet
• salvation eating
• redemptive dieting
• suffering
• chronic illness
• overweight
• obesity
• Australia

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a McArthur Research Fellowship at the University of Melbourne. The writing up was supported by the Australian Government through the Australian Research Council’s Discovery Project scheme [project number DE200100595].

Notes on contributors

Catie Gressier

Catie Gressier is an Australian Research Council (DECRA) Fellow in the Anthropology and Sociology discipline group at the University of Western Australia. Her current research examines rare and heritage breed livestock conservation and agroecological farming in the climate change era. With a regional focus on southern Africa and Australia, Catie has published on issues including the anthropology of food, interspecies relations, tourism, racial and national identities, and issues of health and illness. Her first book, At Home in the Okavango, explores emplacement and belonging among the white citizens of northwest Botswana, while her second book, Illness, Identity and Taboo among Australian Paleo Dieters, examines the body as a site through which neoliberal policies and practices are played out and contested. Catie is an Editorial Board member of Anthropological Forum, and a former University of Melbourne McArthur Fellow.