Governance of the Consuming Passions: A History of Sumptuary Law

Customer Reviews:

The information is fascinating and well analyzed........1999-03-18

Did you know that: -in 1429 Scottish law required that all men with an income over 20 pounds a year wear a fur hat? -an act passed in England, in 1533, stipulated that only members of the Royal Family were allowed to wear purple silk, and that crimson, scarlet or blue velvet could legally be worn only by members of the upper nobility? -in Massachussetts Bay US, in 1651, anyone making less than 200 pounds a year was forbidden to wear gold or silver lace or gold or silver buttons?

Alan Hunt takes us through the fascinating history of dress restrictions. Even today, in our modern capitalistic state, we can see how sumptuary laws still exert influence by observing the vestments worn by the clergy and their assistants.

The book's cover is stunning in all its sumptious beauty. Note the green velvet wedding gown trimmed in ermine and overflowing into a train. The crimson cloth in the bed chamber is elegant. So is the beaver hat worn by the groom in his sable trimmed robe.

The scene is a pastiche of the "Arnolfini Marriage" painted by Jan van Eyck in 1434.

Pauline McKinnon

Average customer rating:

Surprisingly Accessible Recipes

Easy to follow & true to the INN!!!

It doesn't get any better than this...

I'm waiting for a sequel

Captures the pleasure of the inn and is a practical cookbook

The Inn at Little Washington Cookbook: A Consuming Passion
Patrick O'Connell
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Patrick O'Connell's Refined American Cuisine: The Inn at Little Washington

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Happy in the Kitchen: The Craft of Cooking, the Art of Eating

ASIN: 0679447369
Release Date: 1996-11-19

Book Description

This cookbook is the distillation of a life's work by a self-taught American chef who learned to cook by reading cookbooks and went on to become one of the world's most renowned chefs. O'Connell began his career with a catering business in an old farmhouse, cooking on a wood stove with an electric frying pan purchased for $1.49 at a garage sale. (The pan was used for boiling, sautéeing and deep frying for parties of up to 300 guests.) This experience sharpened his awareness of how much could be done with very little. The catering business evolved into a country restaurant and Inn which opened in 1978 in a defunct garage and which is now America's only 5 star Inn. Craig Claiborne raves, "the most magnificent inn I've ever seen, in this country or Europe, where I had the most fantastic meal of my life."

This is not a typical "Chef's Cookbook" filled with esoteric, egomanical, and impossibly complicated recipes which only a wizard with a staff of eighty would ever attempt to produce. Rather, the recipes assembled here make up a practiced, finely honed repertoire of elegant, simple and straight-forward dishes. Everyday ingredients are elevated to new heights through surprising combinations and seductive presentations. [ ]A Consuming Passion[] propels the home cook into a new world of American Haute Cuisine and provides the formulas for reproducing it at home. Careful and detailed instructions, all written by the author, assure success.

Tim Turner's luscious photographs capture the playful but elegant spirit of the food and introduce the reader to some of the charming local characters who provide products for the Inn's kitchen as well as taking the reader on a delightful and romantic culinary journey throughout the Virginia countryside surrounding the small town affectionately known as "Little" Washington and reveals an America we thought was lost forever.

Customer Reviews:

Surprisingly Accessible Recipes.......2007-03-11

This cookbook contains many of the most popular dishes served at the Inn at Little Washington. I was surprised how true the recipes are to the dishes served at the Inn. Few recipes require exotic or inaccessibly expensive ingredients. While some recipes are labor-intensive, others can be prepared rather quickly and easily with excellent results, such as the Rockfish with Mushrooms and Grapes.

The Red Pepper Soup with Sambuca Cream has become a favorite in our house, even among those who typically do not enjoy red pepper. The Medallions of Veal with Calvados Cream is also well worth the effort. The ice-cream recipes in this text are also excellent.

If you are not an avid cook, this book has lovely pictures and makes for a good coffee table book. The text is also well-written and interesting. Highly recommended.

Easy to follow & true to the INN!!!.......2004-01-15

We had the pleasure of spending a weekend at the inn and on one of our 2 dinners there actually ate at the "chef's table" in the kitchen. While there we were able to sample a large portion of the menu and obtain an autographed copy of his cookbook. Upon returning home I assumed the recipes would be convoluted and difficult to follow. THIS IS NOT THE CASE! Patrick's recipes are clear, straight-forward and enable any cook with moderate kitchen skills to wonderfully replicate the dishes he serves at his fantastic inn! If you want to produce delicious dishes, with a hint of southern US, French & Italian influences then buy this book!!! You will not be disappointed & your guests will be amazed!

It doesn't get any better than this..........2002-02-14

We have been guests at the Inn at Little Washington and enjoyed lovely repasts there. In the book, "The Inn at Little Washington Cookbook," we have taken the magnificent offerings to our own table. Especially memorable is the tomato salad, rated the best by the Washington Post reviewer, with tri-colored tomatoes, basil, pine nuts, and shaved asciago cheese - a feast for the eye and the palate. The lobster medallions with grapefruit are delicions and easy to prepare. There is practicality in the preparation and easy-to-find ingredients. The photographs are wonderful. I have given this lovely book to many friends who have shared my delight with Patrick O'Connell's gift from the heart!

I'm waiting for a sequel.......2001-11-14

This is the restaurant by which all other restaurants are measured. It is perfection in every way. Therefore, it is not surprising that I would want the cookbook. What may be surprising to some, then, is how good the book is. There are many notable restaurants and famous chefs are not rare. Chefs, however, who write well and present good cookboooks is less commonplace. The writing is excellent and the recipes turn out as anticipated. I pick up the book (together with Levin's book) sometimes just to recall the most splendid restaurant experience of my life and to look forward to dining there again soon. This should be a good book even for those who have not had my experience; it should be for any lover of good food and good dining.

Captures the pleasure of the inn and is a practical cookbook.......2001-10-17

Having eaten at the Inn twice, it's a real joy to have a cookbook that lets you experience at least part of the joy (the setting there is amazing) at home. O'Connell provides recipes for exotic dishes in a way that makes them accessible for any modestly adept cook. Nor is he pretentious at all - If you don't happen to have foie gras in the fridge for the tuna and foie gras dish, that fine he says. Leave it out.

The dishes are beautiful without being self-indulgently elaborate. The accompanying photos and narrative make it fun to read, but the real value is his practical explanations of how to make extraordinary dishes. Enjoy!

Average customer rating:

Divine chocolate desserts

The best collection in a single book!

This is a keeper!

Heavenly

What a way to go!

Death by Chocolate: The Last Word on a Consuming Passion
Marcel Desaulniers
Manufacturer: Rizzoli
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Chocolate | Baking | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0847825574
Release Date: 2003-11-29

Book Description

Ten years after its original publication, Death by Chocolate remains the ultimate chocolate dessert cookbook. It won the James Beard Award, inspired a television show, and has sold over 100,000 copies. All of the original mouth-watering recipes remain, now supplemented by many new recipes carefully crafted by master-chef Marcel Desaulniers. All preparations and ingredients are included with full-color photographs, allowing mere mortals to create chocolate masterpieces such as the eponymous Death by Chocolate, Chocolate Temptation, and Chocolate Dementia.

Customer Reviews:

Divine chocolate desserts.......2007-01-29

This is an excellent book. I particularly like it as it has photos of every dessert so you can be inspired by the photos and at least you can see what the finished product looks like. The desserts are a little time consuming but you can probably tackle them over a couple of days. I have made a few of the desserts and I can only rave about them.

The best collection in a single book!.......2006-05-28

I've bought this book probably less than a year ago but I already tried several recipes. I have quite a few books for chocolate cakes recipes, but this is the best for sure. And mainly due to this book, my chocolate cakes have been improving a lot. They take time and are relatively expensive but it worth, especially when you see how people enjoy each bite.
Every party with friends it's always a surprise for them, since I try as many new recipes as I can.
Thanks Mr. Desaulnier for sharing such a great talent!

MT, Japan

This is a keeper!.......2006-03-04

I have had this book for ten years. I have yet to see any chocolate-guised cookbook that compares.

I have not dared to make most of the delights in this book (how DOES he stay so skinny?) but have made many. Not being a trained chef of any sort, the instructions are clear, professional and consise. The hardest parts of creating these confections are not getting the book dirty, and deciding which one to make next.

While some reviews have talked about some recipes being "complicated," only the excitement of finally tasting them should be intimidating. It is very rewarding to treat yourself to these deserts after the labor of making them, knowing they are the same things you could enjoy in the world's finest resturants.

Chocolate is center on stage in all these recipies, and this book has increased my reverence for it 100-fold. (And also spoiled me away from sub-par chocolate deserts.)

Heavenly.......2005-10-03

This book is beautiful to look at in addition to having incredible recipes. Some of them are a bit complicated, but for the most part, worth the effort.

What a way to go!.......2005-07-25

Death by Chocolate is the book of books if you are serious about your chocolate. This book is sublime in its luscious photos...one can almost taste them! Where Desaulniers shines most is in his pragmatic, practical approach to cooking with chocolate is that he uses ingredients and supplies the normal, average Joe can get his hands on...nothing exotic or too difficult.

There is a recipe for every taste and culinary skill-level. Some are challenging, some are average, some are just fun. Whoever would have thought of chocolate popcorn!

If you want to treat or impress anyone, the recipes in this book will do it. Every recipe I've made are met with rave reviews...quickly followed by "can I have the recipe."

Desaulniers' tips, teaching, and advice are a great addition. They are valuable and comforting especially when first attempting to create a delicious chocolate concoction. I have not been disappointed in one recipe I've tried...and, they've all worked. His instructions are easy, clear, and right on.

My only critique is that he includes recipes for white chocolate...pu! As a purist (and owing to the fact white chocolate contains no chocolate), these should be put in the trash or another appropriate receptacle.

If you are or know a serious chocolate hound, this is a great book to give as a gift. I've purchased both editions. Finally, if you only have one cookbook on chocolate this one is it, hands down.

Consuming Passions: A Food-Obsessed Life

Average customer rating:

It's all about the recipes!
My Most-Used Cookbook
Feast for the Famished Southern or otherwise
talented novelist delivers delectable, engaging memoir
This could be my Southern family

Consuming Passions: A Food-Obsessed Life
Michael Lee West
Manufacturer: Harper Paperbacks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0060984422
Release Date: 2000-04-04

Amazon.com

Born in Louisiana and at home in Tennessee, author Michael Lee West makes any old body feel downright welcome at her kitchen table. The coffee's hot, the iced tea is sweet, the cake's a little dry, and the conversation shows no sign of abating, even as the last page is turned and the cover is closed on Consuming Passions: A Food-Obsessed Life. The subject is variously food, family, and Mama, wherein Mama is as much a state of mind as an embodied soul. This is about the South, honey, some of which is of the New South stripe, and some of the Old.

In an easy, talkative style, author West spins tales, shares recipes, and hands out advice. In a chapter titled "Funeral Food," she includes recipes for Lemon Chess Pie and Lemon Squares. Among her rules for funeral food, she notes that dishes must be easy to transport as well as appealing to the bereaved. Some foods are simply inappropriate. "I myself have never seen appetizers at a funeral," West writes. "This is not the time to bring Better Than Sex Cake or Death by Chocolate. And it's never a good idea to use uncooked eggs in funeral food."

Consuming Passions is about home cooking, about church-basement food, about growing up in the shadow of Mama's kitchen and learning to cook away from home. West is ever willing to try something new, to fail, to try again, and to defend to her last breath the virtues of her favorite mayonnaise. West has the spirit of a close friend who'll share all her secrets, including her best recipes, some of which her various family members (we meet them all) failed to take to their graves. Sit down, pull up a chair, and get ready to listen. --Schuyler Ingle

Book Description

Consuming Passions is Michael Lee West's delightfully quirky memoir of an adventurous life centered around food and family—the story of how she went from non-cook to gourmet of words and victuals by watching a multitude of relatives squabble, prepare sumptuous repasts, and carry on honored traditions. Laced with delicious secret recipes passed from generation to generation, West's irresistible chronicle recalls good times and wild times—mothers swinging from chandeliers, elderly aunts brewing up love potions, a South American nymphomaniac stirring up trouble at a Louisiana barbeque joint, and the spooky hauntings of a cabbage-eating ghost—all in the pursuit of good dining. Thoroughly entertaining, alive with West's distinctive humor and sharp, irrepressible insight, here are incomparable American kitchen tales as warm and tasty as freshly baked bread.

Customer Reviews:

It's all about the recipes!.......2007-02-06

There's the greatest chocolate cake recipe in the book that I've ever tried, and the spice cake recipe is melt in your mouth wonderful!

My Most-Used Cookbook.......2005-03-26

This book is super, it's full of great stories about wonderful food. I've got a ton of cookbooks and this is the one I use the most. My favorite recipes are the Sweet Potato Souffle, Mashed Potato salad and Egg Salad redipes. I get compliments every time I serve these dishes to people.

I love the stories that accompany these recipes, it's like a lovely piece of history I savor as I eat the yummy food I cooked!

PS I'm a vegetarian and still find this to be a great resource for yummy food. I highly recommend it for anyone who enjoys good food and sentimental, funny stories.

Feast for the Famished Southern or otherwise.......2003-09-09

Fair warning! If you are on a diet or trying to lose weight, this book is lethal. My stars, what a feast of food memoirs complete with rich and tempting recipes! And how I would love some of that coconut cake that emerges from an eight day recipe.

Obviously, West knows her family characters and attaches them to their noted eccentricities and manna. And what colorful, yea memorable, folks these are! Everyone should have a family like hers, with Aunt Tempe, Aunt Dell, Uncle Bun, a marvelous Mama and grandparents and cousins and family gatherings around food that will make you want to go to the kitchen to execute one of the cooking delights featured in the tales.

I was especially fascinated by the pineapple upside down cake cooked in a cast iron skillet, and macaroni and cheese like I never imagined it.

It also thrilled me to learn that West was a slow-to-learn cook herself, yet the obvious love she has for her family and their food eventually became a part of her own mature life.

I think this book would be a fabulous gift to anyone from the South, or anyone who wishes they were. And recipe book fans are definite candidates for receipt of this tome.

Here is a read with laughs and lessons, and it certainly is a keeper for me. Bon appetit, sugar! Meet me in the kitchen!

talented novelist delivers delectable, engaging memoir.......2003-06-10

The author of three marvelous books about eccentric and defiant Southern women, Michael Lee West has concocted a winning recipe of down-home cooking and family history in a charming memoir/cookbook, "Consuming Passions." At peace with her love of food and proud of her women-centered family, West promotes food as the sustenance of all that is worthwhile in life. Her anecdotal style sparkles and her recipes are not only provocative, but understandable, even for amateur Yankee cooks and other such timid kitchen souls.

The members of West's family take larger-than-life shape in this memoir, and the author is unabashedly proud, both of their iconoclastic character and their abilities in the kitchen. West does provide a modest warning: her "Southern tales are like intricate recipes -- part myth, part truth, and part lies." Her mother's insistence on an okra-free gumbo results in her swinging from a chandelier in protest. Her aunt Dell's oversized appetite takes form in her collection of hairless cats, antiques and skewed instructions on food preparation. Even her husband's attempt to raise bees falters when he mistakenly wears dark-colored socks. In the midst of the author's affectionate observations of family eccentricities is her unflagging commitment to a joyous life. Perhaps the most beautiful aspect of the numerous invitations to create in the kitchen is her acceptance of imperfection and failure. West never stops trying, never stops of her sense of adventure, never ceases loving food and family.

When not enmeshed in rhapsodizing about food, West knows how to create food-based metaphor. Disdaining gossip as a "main course," she suggests that it "was more like an enticing appetizer, or a rich, sinful dessert." Partaking of gossip simply can't be helped, "even though you knew you'd be sorry later." Her family's obsession with food even has serious consequences. When a coroner concluded that several men had died in their sleep of heart attacks, her "aunts knew better -- it was death by butter."

At its best, "Consuming Passions" reads quickly; its bite-sized chapters contain both humor and instruction. At its worst, Ms. West's prose tends to have a purple cast, much like the sugared violets she recommends to cause sleep and dissolve anger. Readers who admire Michael Lee West's fictional characters will enjoy her real-life versions; cooks who seek to broaden their repertoire will not be disappointed. She invites you to dig in to the liberating, sensual and powerful influence of food, best shared with people you love.

This could be my Southern family.......2002-12-10

This book was so "homey" to me, I felt like it could be my family. Family traditions are so food centered, and especially for the females, we have our secrets and specialties we like to pass on, or not. My mother once asked me, "Do you think they go all out like we do?" After reading, West's book, I know we Southerners share more similarities than differences.

Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens

Average customer rating:

Scholarly book for educated readers
Extraordinary!
brings the ancient world to life but tough to finish
Not just for classicists
Fishy stuff

Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens
James Davidson
Manufacturer: Perennial
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0060977663

Amazon.com

Desire is a dangerous thing, and the relationship between the citizens of ancient Athens and their desires was a complex and troubled one. James Davidson's Courtesans and Fishcakes is a brilliant and kaleidoscopic examination of daily life in classical Athens, and the life he reveals is simultaneously more alien and more familiar than we might have imagined. From fish-guzzling gourmands to the ambiguous eroticism of vase paintings, the cradle of Western culture is artfully, and frequently amusingly, anatomized. Davidson believes that many historians, under the influence of Foucault, are guilty of imposing modern views of desire, and particularly sexuality, on Greek culture, resulting in a simplistic interpretation of what was an extremely complicated issue. He refutes the prevailing opinion that sex in Athens was a simple binary opposition of penetrator and penetrated, drawing on a remarkable number of sources to show how sexuality was a slippery commodity rooted in intricate social negotiations, a characteristic shared with many other objects of desire, from eels to undiluted wine. Davidson sometimes assumes a little too much knowledge on the part of his audience--some basic information about the size of the Athenian population would have been helpful--but in spite of this Courtesans and Fishcakes is both accessible and provocative, offering a fascinating portrait of the private and public lives of ancient Athenians. --Simon Leake

Customer Reviews:

Scholarly book for educated readers.......2007-03-12

Be advised: this book is slow reading. Unlike Athenians at fish fests you will not gorge on the paragraphs as they come hot off the pages. I am a book a day man but this fellow took me more than two weeks. I will admit to other reading during that time , but this book was not for work, which is often the case with chapter a day reads. I know my Lit Crit theory. I have a little Latin and less Greek, and I needed them for this book, and yet every so often a wonderful prospect of words and word connectedness blossomed from this suggestive title, sort of like those rather suggestive amarillis stems and blossoms. I would add, that familiarity with contemporary literary critical theory would also help in appreciating what Davidson has achieved which is a learned and creative picture of that shaping and yet alien culture which was Athens.

Any teacher who has had to explain how tragedy fits into the Athenian vision with its strict moral code but lacking the ideas of sinful guilt will appreciate the careful path the author treads as he looks at a very different vision of addiction and desire from that we find in modern culture. Keep a good dictionary nearby while reading. Keep a bookmark too. You will want to, pause, set this side frome time to time, and think

Extraordinary!.......2005-04-11

A marvelously written, intricate weave from an incredible array of sources that illuminates the significance of Greek appetites (especially for fish -- yes, fish -- and for sex, in multiple forms and layers) and attitudes toward them, and thus, on the way, as it were, what was regarded as virtuous, that the author convincingly shows were central to social, philosophical and poltical life in classical Athens. An extraordinary book offering amazing insights. One awaits the next set of revelations, if there are more to be delivered to us, by Mr. Davidson, with something resembling opsophagia. A tour de force!

brings the ancient world to life but tough to finish.......2004-03-12

The best part of the book is how it brings the ancient world to life. What did these folks do day-to-day? That said unless you're doing an academic thesis on this topic you might lose interest halfway through.

Not just for classicists.......2003-04-17

While I would grant that this is a scholarly work by a serious historian I found it an engaging read and quite fascinating. It is one of the few books I have read that really helps one get into the mindset (mentalite) of another civilization, far distant in time and space. I don't think one needs an encyclopaedic knowledge of ancient Greece to appreciate this book but some exposure to other studies of mentalites might be helpful.

Fishy stuff.......2001-10-23

This isn't a bad book. The writing is pretty good and it is loaded with trivial facts about Athenians. It is interesting in that one gets to flirt with entering quite an alien culture and gets to try and equate it with how we live today.
The author never really brought this alive for me but it was good enough that I finished it.

Consuming Passions: Help for Compulsive Shoppers

Average customer rating:

I don't have a copy yet but wanbted to respond to another poster
Do Not Buy this book on amazon
Buy This Book
Consuming Passions

Consuming Passions: Help for Compulsive Shoppers
Ellen Mohr Catalano , and Nina Sonenberg
Manufacturer: New Harbinger Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1879237385

Customer Reviews:

I don't have a copy yet but wanbted to respond to another poster.......2007-09-24

This book is out of print published in 1992 if you start tring to find copies online you will find just a few sources at lower prices and I have seen some online prices as high as $183 and yes that is for the paperback edition. Not trying to defend the prices being charged for copies of this book which is keeping me from getting a copy right now but wanted to point out Amazon or should we say it's used book partners aren't ripping people off jsut charging what seems to be a going rate. The only really cheaper price I found was listed for a reseller that only had a two out five star rating at the site linking to it.

Oh I gave the book a three star rating since as I stated I don't have a copy but felt the need to point out why the pice is much higher than the cover amount.

Do Not Buy this book on amazon.......2005-02-09

You can buy this book over the counter for $12.00 (it is even written on the book) but these people are selling it for $40.00! Check out your nearest bookstore and save yourself some money. I guess they think overspenders will spend more that what something is worth.

Buy This Book.......2003-09-22

Buy this book if you are a compulsive shopper. Yes, that seems to be a contradiction. However, it has two purposes -- it not only gets you a good book on the subject, it gets you started on the road of seeing where your values are and only buying things that will really benefit you.

The book is easy to read and in small chunks so that it can be read in small increments of time. The only problem I found was that the words are too close to the edges of the page so that it makes it hard to hold in one hand without covering up the text.

For the impatient reader, I suggest reading chapter 1 ("The Smiled-Upon Addiction") followed by chapter 7 ("Anxiety and Stress Relief"). Chapters 8 ("Alternatives to Shopping: From A to Z") and 9 ("Fighting Back") are optional but worth skimming. Some chapters, like chapter 5 ("Keeping Track of Shopping Behaviors), chapter 6 ("Learning from Your Shopping Record") and chapter 10 ("Taking Control of Your Finances"), may be old-hat to those of us that have been in this predicament for a while. So, if it will keep you from recovery, skip those for now.

Since there are few good books on how to overcome similar problems, this is a good book.

Consuming Passions.......2002-11-23

I have struggled with Compulsive shopping for 15 years and never knew why. This book explained why I do it. I believe knowing why you do a behavior is half the battle of overcoming it. I highly recommend this book!

Consuming Passions: Food in the Age of Anxiety

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Consuming Passions: Food in the Age of Anxiety

Manufacturer: Manchester University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1901341062

Book Description

Descartes is to blame. For centuries his tag "I think therefore I am" has dominated our notion of ourselves and the world; that the mind is what counts seems to be the message of Cartesianism, the body could fend for itself. What people thought has been central to academic study, what they ate was considered marginal and insignificant. But the picture is changing. Food, after all is fundamental. Critics in English literature are beginning to theorize about the significance of food in texts, "edible ecriture" as Terry Eagleton calls it. Historians chart the relationship between what we eat and how we live. Sociologists deconstruct the family meal. Psychiatrists ponder the inexorable rise of eating disorders. Philosophers construct the moral frameworks for ethical eating; and scientists work with social scientists as killer diseases, food borne, sweep the country. This book unites scientists, social scientists and those working in the humanities in a call for food to be studied more in universities across disciplines--and for those involved in its study no longer to be marginalized.

Average customer rating:

An All Consuming Passion
William J. Lines
Manufacturer: Allen & Unwin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1863735534

Book Description

Set against the magnificent backdrop of Australia's geological, human, and natural history, An All Consuming Passion is the story of amateur botanist Georgiana Molloy. In 1829 she married a retired Army captain and emigrated from Scotland to the remote southwestern corner of Australia. William Lines weaves the story of Molloy's life and increasing commitment to botany with the broader story of colonial invasion. He uses Molloy's experience--known mostly through her prolific letters--to highlight issues such as gender inequality in colonial society, the British misunderstanding and abuse of Aboriginal culture, and the impact of Aborigines and colonists on the landscape of Australia.

Consuming Passions The Anthropology of Eating

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Consuming Passions The Anthropology of Eating
Peter Farb and George Armelagos
Manufacturer: Houghton Miffin Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000MUZEQ8

The Consuming Passion: Christianity & the Consumer Culture

Average customer rating:

Starts out with a whimper and ends up with a dud.

The Consuming Passion: Christianity & the Consumer Culture

Manufacturer: InterVarsity Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

Sociology | Religious Studies | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0830818979

Customer Reviews:

Starts out with a whimper and ends up with a dud........2003-07-04

The editor of this book, Rodney Clamp, selected 10 essays that would look at`consumption' and `capitalism' in America, from a Christian theological perspective.

While his intent is laudable, his selection of essays is disappointing. Out of the ten essays I found only three to be engaging: John Tropman's "Catholic & Protestant Ethic", Craig Gay's "Sensualist Without Heart" and Bill McKibben's "Returning God to the Center". The remaining essays were pedantic and academic, for example, one writer states, "The Christian patristic vision offers a coherent metaphysic in which to interpret and to address issues of ecology and global consumption." Really? I do say.

Clamp wants to sound the alarm and establish a new Christian theology, which he titles: the "theology of consumption" . These ten essays are his attempt to bring forth this new theology. In these essays he juxtaposes consumerism and capitalism, finding both to be in dire need of Christian redemption. As he understands it, "consumer capitalism's" problem is not with the "legitimacy of making money" (that's OK), but what gets Clamp is what we, the American consumer, actually enjoy spending the money we earn! Go figure. Rodney Clamp fails to realize that `consumption' and `consumer' are pejorative terms that can not be separated from the American ethos. Neither can consumerism nor consumption in America be tamed by a Christian theology.

So, if you are a student of the "American consumer", and you are used to reading engaging writers like Eric Schlosser's
"Fast Food Nation" or Lizabeth Cohen's A Consumer Republic you will most likely find this book dense, difficult and disappointing. However, if you have hours to burn, and you want to plod through seven uninspiring essays, then, yes, you could glean insight and something of value. This book is really targeting ministers, professors of theology or students of American consumerism. Conditionally recommended.

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