Discourses of Distinction in Contemporary Palestinian Extra-Virgin Olive Oil Production

Abstract

This article shows how Palestinian producers, faced with an “existential threat” to their own physical locality, seek to re-qualify their goods such as olive oil not only as elite goods based on the discourse of distinction of taste, but also in politically-inflected global discourses of distinction that attend to how the product is sourced, produced, and exchanged. Palestinian entrepreneurs and NGO-sponsored agricultural professionals are making olive oil “distinctive,” thereby seeking to locate these Palestinian products as elite goods within a global space of circulation and distinction. To produce this kind of extra-virgin olive oil, production practices must change and new skills must be inculcated, like organoleptic “tasting practices.” Ethical consumerism is promoted through fair trade strategies which seek to connect producer with consumer, embedding Palestinian olive oil with a “taste of solidarity.” “Quality” is perceived as a tool to gain international recognition of its olive oil and, by proxy, of Palestine itself.

Notes

This article is based on data from a preliminary field trip to Palestine in April 2006; this short trip with a group affiliated with the British branch of Jews for Justice who imported Palestinian olive oil was enormously important in formulating my project, which was subsequently funded by Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada. I conducted participant observation with Palestinian families and international volunteers in the fall of 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011. I made additional fieldtrips in spring of 2007, 2008, and 2009 to interview olive oil producers and professionals (those involved in running co-ops, NGOs, testers, tasters, and marketers) when the hectic olive pressing season was over. For the past five years, I have conducted participant observation with volunteers who participate in distributing Palestinian olive oil in Toronto, Washington, and London. I have also conducted ongoing archival research, as much of the activism surrounding the distribution of Palestinian olive oil is web based. This kind of “multi-sited” (Marcus) field research is necessary for this project that considers how the production, consumption, and circulation of food commodities are fundamentally connected.

Palestinians in the United States told me of how they welcomed gifts of olive oil from relatives and friends in Palestine.

Walker and Manning note a similar distinction in the production of Georgian wine.

Both PARC and Canaan have in-house chemical testers, although external testers are used for organic certifications and exports to the EU. Other smaller co-operatives send their oil to the Chemistry Department at Bir Zeit University, at least in the Ramallah district.

Please see Heath and Meneley (2007) for a discussion of techne and technoscience in contemporary food production, and Anne Meneley (2007) for a discussion of the transformation of olive oil production in Tuscany.

Please see Meneley (2008) for the hindrances on producing extra-virgin olive oil as a result of the Israeli occupation.

Both the olive-picking tours and the Olive Festival are not only announced on Canaan's website but also on their Facebook page.

These awards were announced on specialtyfoods.com.