For this project I listened to Flying Food by 99% Invisible, Coming Out as Meatless by Gravy, and The Miracle Apple by the network NPR. Here at Michigan State University I am studying Graphic Design and Creative Advertising. So immediately I took it upon myself to look up podcasts about food advertisement. I listened to a few and wasn’t really intrigued but then I found Flying Food by 99% Invisible and was hooked. This shorter podcast talks about the creation of food advertisements and how often what is advertised looks far more appetizing than what you actually receive. The next podcast I came across was Coming Out as Meatless by Gravy. The podcast talked about stigmas that come along with the food we eat and how our diets translate to those around us, specifically our family. The podcast centers around Choya Webb and his experience of coming out as both gay and vegetarian to his family. Lastly, I listened to The Miracle Apple which is about the apple revolution that has occurred. Previously you would go to the store and pick a red, yellow, or green apple. It was simple. But now the consumer has options of apple brands to choose from. The podcast explores this change through one farmer’s experience in his creation of The Honey Crisp Apple. Flying Food and the Miracle Apple’s themes are heavily intertwined. Both articles focus on the marketing of food. As a whole these podcasts are related in their roots. All three talk about food with deeper meaning than simply nourishment. They all exemplify how food is much bigger than that. Food is a product, who we are, who we gather with, and how we and others define ourselves.
The podcast Flying Food discusses how television changed food advertising. It goes into detail about the great lengths directors had to go to get the food to appear as beautiful and delicious on camera. An invention called a rig came in handy because it allowed producers to project food from it and then record it in slow motion. For some reason I found this hysterical. Why had shrimp and oranges flying through the air across my TV screen never occurred to me as odd? The tendency to romanticize food is so common in advertisement. Advertisements set the bar for food appearance so high. This makes me question if food advertising contributes to the huge food waste scandal that is happening in America and other places around the global. Food waste was called to my attention from watching Tristram Stuart’s Ted Talk in class. A lot of the food farmers grown never even leave the field because they don’t meet a certain standard for color or size. Even in super markets a lot of produce goes to the trash for not meeting consumer’s standards of appearance. This standard has been formed in part as a byproduct of the beautification of food in advertisements. Food advertisements have formed a correlation between appearance of food and quality. This may contribute to the huge food waste scandal that is happening globally. If this is a problem that stemmed from advertising, is it also one that could be fixed by advertising?
Out of all three podcasts Flying Food used design choices most effectively to communicate its point. At the start of the podcast a food advertisement started to play, and my initial thought was, “Oh gosh not another ad.” Suddenly a ton of ads starting playing at once and I realized that this wasn’t a paid ad, but rather an intentional example of how overwhelmingly common ads are. Throughout the podcast there was almost constant music or advertisement audio tracks. To some listeners this might have been overwhelming, but for me it was perfect. The constant sounds sucked in my full attention. The podcast might have only been 20 minutes, but it took full advantage of that time. The only thing I didn’t enjoy about this podcast was that it constantly changed up speakers, but they weren’t always introduced. For a listener this can take away from the credibility of what is being said.
Coming Out as Meatless is Gravy’s podcast that talks about the stress that becoming a vegetarian imposed on Choya Webb’s relationship with his biracial Texan family. We learn that growing up in Texas in a black community meant that for Choya and his family eating meat was correlated with manliness. In addition, eating meat meant you were another normal member of the family. Choya’s mom said, “Food was our own language in our house… If somebody loved you, they’d stuff your face.” This podcast compares Choya’s struggles of coming out as meatless to coming out as gay. It puts focus on how diet is an essential part of our identity. Similar to race, age, and appearance there is stigmas that come with it. At the end of the podcast the host interviews Choya’s parents and they reveal that ultimately they accept him, but fear what his community would think of him. Coming Out as Meatless opened my eyes to how much our diets say about us, our beliefs, and how we were raised to others. This podcast reminded me of the Food Autobiographies we completed in class. In a lot of ways this podcast served as a Food Autobiography for Choya. His experience is unique, yet relatable. We all come from different food backgrounds that define us and speak volumes to the people around us.
This podcast started off with a quick introduction from the host and also a quote from Choya where he expresses the thought, “Why can’t zuccinni be soul food?” This witty statement off the bat gives us a taste of who Choya is, and almost serves as a thesis for the podcast. Coming out as meatless is interview heavy. If the host wasn’t talking to Choya, she was talking to one of his family members. It all seems very genuine; the show even concludes with the host going to a dinner with his family. In order to make the show smooth, musical transitions are used between speakers. In addition, music is used to appeal to pathos in moments when Choya speaks of his troubles and when the show concludes with his Grandma telling the host truly how proud she is of Choya.
The Miracle Apple is all about one farmer’s quest to create a new tasty apple. It begins by talking about the infamous Red Delicious Apple, that was the only option offered in his childhood. This apple looked delicious, but tasted mushy. He grew up hating apples. It wasn’t till college when someone brought him a yellow apple from Michigan. It tasted great and that’s when he decided to devote his life to apple farming. In his words he was, “trying to save the world from mediocre apples.” This mission is a long one, because it takes 5 years just to test one new breed of apples. Finally, he found a perfect new breed and named it the Honey Crisp Apple. Honey Crips took a long time to implement, but once they hit stores, they sold like crazy. Other farmers saw this and began growing these apples too. To prevent this the farmer and inventor put a trademark on his apple, The Honey Crisp. This was the beginning of the apple revolution. Today all the apples we see in supermarkets are trademarked and branded. I didn’t find this podcast that relatable. I recognize that there are apple brands in the supermarket. However, I usually refer to apples by color, rather than a brand name. This “apple revolution” probably isn’t noticeable to me because of the way apples are packaged. As we learned in the podcast, The History of Food Packaging, packaging allows for food to be branded. Prior to food packaging, food brands weren’t prevalent. Apples in the store come in bins with signs over them proclaiming what they are. Then you take them home and peel off the sticker without much thought. Apples don’t come in branded boxes that sit in your pantry for you to look at time and time again. The attempt to brand apples show how food is truly a business in American society. Even the most basic produce item can’t escape the world of marketing.
Out of all three podcasts, The Miracle Apple had the worst design choices. The podcast was interview heavy, but nothing was implemented to assure smooth transitions between talkers. There was music merely at the beginning and end. It was rock music and didn’t mesh well with the story. The one thing I did like about the podcast is how they gave a background of the farmer’s life before getting to the main point. Hearing how he devoted his whole adult life to this profession made what he was saying more credible.
All three podcasts I listened to were stories about food meant to entertain and inform. They were more than just information and facts stated aloud. The podcasts were drive by purpose. Each had its own overarching theme which determined how content was displayed. Design choices were most successful when they helped get points across, or eased listening.
Food is nourishment. However, in today’s society it has become something much greater. In this class we learn about how modern food systems and cultural are largely complex. In fact, they are so complex that there are endless resources like podcasts talking about them. In Coming out as Meatless we see how food acts as a cultural definition of one’s self. Food characterizes what type of people we are today, while also giving us a peak at the people we came from. In both Flying Food and The Miracle apple food acts as a product. Food is a competitive industry, requiring marketing and advertising. From all these podcasts we learn that food is no longer simply food anymore. In today’s society food acts as a business as well as cultural capital that defines who we are.
The podcast Flying Food discusses how television changed food advertising. It goes into detail about the great lengths directors had to go to get the food to appear as beautiful and delicious on camera. An invention called a rig came in handy because it allowed producers to project food from it and then record it in slow motion. For some reason I found this hysterical. Why had shrimp and oranges flying through the air across my TV screen never occurred to me as odd? The tendency to romanticize food is so common in advertisement. Advertisements set the bar for food appearance so high. This makes me question if food advertising contributes to the huge food waste scandal that is happening in America and other places around the global. Food waste was called to my attention from watching Tristram Stuart’s Ted Talk in class. A lot of the food farmers grown never even leave the field because they don’t meet a certain standard for color or size. Even in super markets a lot of produce goes to the trash for not meeting consumer’s standards of appearance. This standard has been formed in part as a byproduct of the beautification of food in advertisements. Food advertisements have formed a correlation between appearance of food and quality. This may contribute to the huge food waste scandal that is happening globally. If this is a problem that stemmed from advertising, is it also one that could be fixed by advertising?
Out of all three podcasts Flying Food used design choices most effectively to communicate its point. At the start of the podcast a food advertisement started to play, and my initial thought was, “Oh gosh not another ad.” Suddenly a ton of ads starting playing at once and I realized that this wasn’t a paid ad, but rather an intentional example of how overwhelmingly common ads are. Throughout the podcast there was almost constant music or advertisement audio tracks. To some listeners this might have been overwhelming, but for me it was perfect. The constant sounds sucked in my full attention. The podcast might have only been 20 minutes, but it took full advantage of that time. The only thing I didn’t enjoy about this podcast was that it constantly changed up speakers, but they weren’t always introduced. For a listener this can take away from the credibility of what is being said.
Coming Out as Meatless is Gravy’s podcast that talks about the stress that becoming a vegetarian imposed on Choya Webb’s relationship with his biracial Texan family. We learn that growing up in Texas in a black community meant that for Choya and his family eating meat was correlated with manliness. In addition, eating meat meant you were another normal member of the family. Choya’s mom said, “Food was our own language in our house… If somebody loved you, they’d stuff your face.” This podcast compares Choya’s struggles of coming out as meatless to coming out as gay. It puts focus on how diet is an essential part of our identity. Similar to race, age, and appearance there is stigmas that come with it. At the end of the podcast the host interviews Choya’s parents and they reveal that ultimately they accept him, but fear what his community would think of him. Coming Out as Meatless opened my eyes to how much our diets say about us, our beliefs, and how we were raised to others. This podcast reminded me of the Food Autobiographies we completed in class. In a lot of ways this podcast served as a Food Autobiography for Choya. His experience is unique, yet relatable. We all come from different food backgrounds that define us and speak volumes to the people around us.
This podcast started off with a quick introduction from the host and also a quote from Choya where he expresses the thought, “Why can’t zuccinni be soul food?” This witty statement off the bat gives us a taste of who Choya is, and almost serves as a thesis for the podcast. Coming out as meatless is interview heavy. If the host wasn’t talking to Choya, she was talking to one of his family members. It all seems very genuine; the show even concludes with the host going to a dinner with his family. In order to make the show smooth, musical transitions are used between speakers. In addition, music is used to appeal to pathos in moments when Choya speaks of his troubles and when the show concludes with his Grandma telling the host truly how proud she is of Choya.
The Miracle Apple is all about one farmer’s quest to create a new tasty apple. It begins by talking about the infamous Red Delicious Apple, that was the only option offered in his childhood. This apple looked delicious, but tasted mushy. He grew up hating apples. It wasn’t till college when someone brought him a yellow apple from Michigan. It tasted great and that’s when he decided to devote his life to apple farming. In his words he was, “trying to save the world from mediocre apples.” This mission is a long one, because it takes 5 years just to test one new breed of apples. Finally, he found a perfect new breed and named it the Honey Crisp Apple. Honey Crips took a long time to implement, but once they hit stores, they sold like crazy. Other farmers saw this and began growing these apples too. To prevent this the farmer and inventor put a trademark on his apple, The Honey Crisp. This was the beginning of the apple revolution. Today all the apples we see in supermarkets are trademarked and branded. I didn’t find this podcast that relatable. I recognize that there are apple brands in the supermarket. However, I usually refer to apples by color, rather than a brand name. This “apple revolution” probably isn’t noticeable to me because of the way apples are packaged. As we learned in the podcast, The History of Food Packaging, packaging allows for food to be branded. Prior to food packaging, food brands weren’t prevalent. Apples in the store come in bins with signs over them proclaiming what they are. Then you take them home and peel off the sticker without much thought. Apples don’t come in branded boxes that sit in your pantry for you to look at time and time again. The attempt to brand apples show how food is truly a business in American society. Even the most basic produce item can’t escape the world of marketing.
Out of all three podcasts, The Miracle Apple had the worst design choices. The podcast was interview heavy, but nothing was implemented to assure smooth transitions between talkers. There was music merely at the beginning and end. It was rock music and didn’t mesh well with the story. The one thing I did like about the podcast is how they gave a background of the farmer’s life before getting to the main point. Hearing how he devoted his whole adult life to this profession made what he was saying more credible.
All three podcasts I listened to were stories about food meant to entertain and inform. They were more than just information and facts stated aloud. The podcasts were drive by purpose. Each had its own overarching theme which determined how content was displayed. Design choices were most successful when they helped get points across, or eased listening.
Food is nourishment. However, in today’s society it has become something much greater. In this class we learn about how modern food systems and cultural are largely complex. In fact, they are so complex that there are endless resources like podcasts talking about them. In Coming out as Meatless we see how food acts as a cultural definition of one’s self. Food characterizes what type of people we are today, while also giving us a peak at the people we came from. In both Flying Food and The Miracle apple food acts as a product. Food is a competitive industry, requiring marketing and advertising. From all these podcasts we learn that food is no longer simply food anymore. In today’s society food acts as a business as well as cultural capital that defines who we are.