The appearance is that one can choose from many literacies, instead of being forced into one. The fact is that we are chosen in virtue of having our identity constituted and confirmed within the pragmatic context. Awareness of and interaction with nature, already affected in the previous age of industrial processing of basic foods, are further eroded. The immediate environment and the sources of nutrition it provides are assimilated in the picture of seasonless and context-free shelves at the supermarket. Space (where does the food come from?) and time (to which season does it correspond?) distinctions, accounted for so precisely in literacy, dissolve in a generic continuum. One does not need to be rich to have access to what used to be the food of those who could afford it. One does not need to be from a certain part of the world to enjoy what used to be the exotic quality of food. Time and space shrink for the traveler or TV viewer, as they shrink for the supermarket patron. They shrink even more for the increasing number of people shopping through the World Wide Web, according to formulas custom designed for them. With brand recognition, brands become more important than the food. The rhythms of nature and the rhythm of work and life are pulled further apart by the mediating mechanisms of marketing. The natural identity of food vanishes in the subsequent practical experience of artificial reality. There is little that distinguishes between a menu designed for the team of the space shuttle, for the military personnel in combat far from home, and the energy calculations for a machine. A little artificial taste of turkey for Thanksgiving, or the cleverly simulated smell of apple pie, makes the difference.
The language of expectations
Beasts of habit, people expect some reminders of taste and texture even when they know that what they eat or drink is the result of a formula, not of natural processes. This is why the almost fat-free hamburger, devised in laboratories for people in need of nourishment adapted to new conditions of life and work, will succeed or fail not on the basis of calories, but on the simulation of the taste of the real thing. This is how the new Coke failed. Non-alcoholic beer and wine, fat- and sugar-free ice cream, low cholesterol egg, vegetable ham, and all substitutes for milk, butter, and cream, to list a few, are in the same situation. In the fast lane of the civilization of illiteracy, we expect fast food: hamburgers, fish, chicken, pizza, and Chinese, Indian, Mexican, Thai, and other foods. The barriers of time and space are overcome through pre-processing, microwave ovens, and genetic engineering. But we do not necessarily accept the industrial model of mass production, reminiscent of literacy characteristics quite different from those of home cooking.
We cannot afford those long cooking cycles, consuming energy and especially time, that resulted in what some remember as the kitchen harmony of smell and taste, as well as in waste and dubious nutritional value, one should add. A McDonalds hamburger is close to the science fiction image of a world consuming only the energy source necessary for functioning. But the outlet reminds one of machines. It is still a manned operation, with live operators, geared to offer a uniform industrial quality. However, the literate structure gives way to more effective functioning. At intervals defined by a program continuously tracking consumption, the restaurant is stocked with the pre-processed items on the menu. None of the cooks needs to know how to write or read; food preparation is on-line, in real time. And if the requirements of the pragmatics of the civilization of illiteracy overcome the current industrial model, the new McDonalds will be able to meet individual expectations no less restricted than those of the Internet pizza providers. If this does not happen, McDonalds and its many imitators in the world will disappear, just as many of the mass production food manufacturers have already disappeared.
The mediating nature of the processes involved in nourishment is revealing. Between the natural and artificial sources of protein, fats, sugar, and other groups recommended for a balanced meal and the person eating them with the expectation of looking, feeling, and performing better, of living longer and healthier, there are many layers of processing, controlling, and measuring. Many formulas for preparation follow each other, or are applied in parallel cycles. After we made machines that resemble humans, we started treating ourselves as machines. The digital engine stands for the brain, pump for the heart, circuits for the nervous system. They are all subjected to maintenance cycles, clean sources of energy, self-cleaning mechanisms, diagnostic routines. The end product of food production-a customized pizza, taco, egg roll, hamburger, gefilte fish-resembles the "real thing," which is produced at the lowest possible cost in a market in which literate food is a matter of the past, a subject of reminiscence.
The new dynamics of change and the expectation of adaptability and permanence associated with the nourishment of the civilization of literacy collide at all levels involved in our need to eat and drink. What results from this conflict are the beautiful down-sized kitchens dominated by the microwave oven, the new cookware adapted to the fast food and efficient nourishment, the cooking instructions downloaded from the digital network into the kitchen. The interconnectedness of the world takes rather subtle aspects when it comes to food. Microwave ovens can perfectly be seen as peripheral devices connected to the smart kitchens of the post-industrial age, all set to feed us once we push the dials that will translate a desire, along with our health profile, into a code number. Three-quarters of all American households (Barbie's included) use a microwave oven. And many of them are bound to become an address on the Internet, as other appliances already are.
The conflict between literate and illiterate nourishment is also documented by the manner in which people write, draw, film, televise, and express themselves about cooking and related matters. This addresses the communication aspects of the practical experience of what and how we eat. The people who could go to their back yard for fresh onions or cabbage, get meat from animals they hunted or tended, or milk their own cow or goat, belong to a pragmatic framework different from that of people who buy produce, meat, cheese, and canned and frozen food in a small store or a supermarket. To communicate experiences that vanished because of their low efficiency is an exercise in history or fiction. To communicate current experiences in nourishment means to acknowledge mediation, distribution of tasks, networking, and open-endedness as they apply to communication and the way we feed ourselves or are fed by others. It also means to acknowledge a different quality.
Once upon a time, writing on food and dining was part of literature. Food authorities have been celebrated as writers. But with the advent of nourishment strategies, literate writing gave way to a prose of recipes almost as idiosyncratic as recipes for the mass production of soap, or cookbooks for programming. Some gourmets complained. Food experts suggested that precision was as good for cooking as temperature gauges. The understanding of how close the act of cooking is to writing about it, or, in our days to the tele-reality of the kitchen, or to the new interactive gadgets loaded with recipes for the virtual reality cooking game, is often missing. When conditions for exercising fantasy in the kitchen are no longer available, fantasy deserts the food pages and moves into the scripts of the national gourmet video programs and computer games-or on Web sites. Moreover, when predetermined formulas for bouillons, salad dressings, cakes, and puddings replace the art of selecting and preparing, the writing disappears behind the information added according to regulation, as vitamins are added to milk and cereals. A super-cook defines what is appropriate, and the efficient formula turns our kitchens into private processing plants ensuring the most efficient result. What is gained is the possibility to assemble meals in combinations of nutritional modules and to integrate elements from all over the world without the risk of more than a new experience for our taste buds. From the industrial age, we inherited processing techniques guaranteeing uniformity of flavor and standards of hygiene. The price we pay for this is the pleasure, the adventure, the unique experience. Food writing is based on the assumptions of uniformity. In contrast, cooking shows started exploring the worlds of technological progress, in which you don't cook because you are hungry or need to feed your family. You do it for competitive reasons, in order to achieve recognition for mastering new utensils and learning the names of new ingredients. In the post-industrial, the challenge is to break into the territory of innovation and ascertain practical experiences of cooking, presentation, and eating, freed from literate constraints.
Coping with the right to affluence
Pragmatic frameworks are not chosen, like food from a menu or toppings from a list. Practical experiences of human self-constitution within a pragmatic framework are the concrete embodiments of belonging to such a pragmatics. A new pragmatic framework negates the previous one, but does not eliminate it. Although these points were made in earlier chapters, there is a specific reason for dealing with them again here. As opposed to other experiences, nourishment is bound to involve more elements of continuity than science or the military. As we have already seen, literacy-based forms of preparing and eating food exist parallel to illiterate nourishment. This is the reason why some peculiar forms of social redistribution of food need to be discussed.