About this item
The Gilded Age is renowned for a variety of reasons, including its culture of conspicuous consumption among the newly rich. In the domain of food, conspicuous consumption manifested itself in appetites for expensive dishes and lavish dinner parties. These received ample publicity at the time, resulting later on in well-developed historical depictions of upper-class eating habits.This book delves into the eating habits of people of lesser means. Concerning Blacks, the working class, the impoverished, immigrants, and others our historical representations have been relatively superficial. The author changes that by turning to the late nineteenth century's infant science of nutrition for a look at eating and drinking. Through the lens of the earliest food consumption studies conducted in the United States.
About the Author
Robert Dirks grew up in suburban Milwaukee. After earning a Ph.D. in anthropology at Case Western Reserve University, he joined the faculty at Illinois State University. He retired from there as Emeritus Professor in 2003.
Over the course of his career, Professor Dirks conducted research on various topics, including both food habits and nutrition worldwide. His publications include papers in the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Current Anthropology, American Anthropologist, Cross-Cultural Research, World Cultures, Journal of Nutrition, and Annual Review of Nutrition. His previous book, Come & Get It! McDonaldization and the Disappearance of Local Food from a Central Illinois Community, traced a changing American food culture from frontier days to the beginning of the twenty-first century. His current book, Food in the Gilded Age surveys eating habits toward the end of the 19th century through the investigations of America's earliest nutritionists.
