This book explains how America became a meat-eating nation - from the colonial period to the present. It examines the relationships between consumer preference and meat processing - looking closely at the production of beef, pork, chicken, and hot dogs. The author argues that a series of new technologies have transformed American meat. He draws on detailed consumption surveys that shed new light on America's eating preferences - especially differences associated with income, rural versus urban areas, and race and ethnicity.

How did meat become such a popular food among Americans? And why did the popularity of some types of meat increase or decrease? Putting Meat on the American Table explains how America became a meat-eating nation - from the colonial period to the present. It examines the relationships between consumer preference and meat processing - looking closely at the production of beef, pork, chicken, and hot dogs. Roger Horowitz argues that a series of new technologies have transformed American meat - sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better. He draws on detailed consumption surveys that shed new light on America's eating preferences - especially differences associated with income, rural versus urban areas, and race and ethnicity. Engagingly written, richly illustrated, and abundant with first-hand accounts and quotes from period sources, Putting Meat on the American Table will captivate general readers and interest all students of the history of food, technology, business, and American culture.

Co-winner of the 2015 Salon London Transmission Prize Get into the best schools. Land your next big promotion. Dress for success. Run faster. Play tougher. Work harder. Keep score. And whatever you do -- make sure you win. Competition runs through every aspect of our lives today. From the cubicle to the race track, in business and love, religion and science, what matters now is to be the biggest, fastest, meanest, toughest, richest. The upshot of all these contests? As Margaret Heffernan shows in this eye-opening book, competition regularly backfires, producing an explosion of cheating, corruption, inequality, and risk. The demolition derby of modern life has damaged our ability to work together. But it doesn't have to be this way. CEOs, scientists, engineers, investors, and inventors around the world are pioneering better ways to create great products, build enduring businesses, and grow relationships. Their secret? Generosity. Trust. Time. Theater. From the cranberry bogs of Massachusetts to the classrooms of Singapore and Finland, from tiny start-ups to global engineering firms and beloved American organizations -- like Ocean Spray, Eileen Fisher, Gore, and Boston Scientific -- Heffernan discovers ways of living and working that foster creativity, spark innovation, reinforce our social fabric, and feel so much better than winning.

Full of humor and wit, this book was offered in 1827 in order that servants be given a handbook by which they might more efficiently perform the duties for which they were being paid.

Essential essays on the environmental impacts of factory farms on public health. The rapid—and relatively recent—concentration of food animal production into factory farms makes meat plentiful and cheap, but this type of agriculture comes at a great cost to human health and the environment. In Industrial Farm Animal Production, the Environment, and Public Health, editors James Merchant and Robert Martin bring together public health experts to explore the most critical topics related to industrial farm animal production. The environmental impacts of these concentrated animal-feeding operations endanger the health of farm and meatpacking workers, neighbors, and surrounding communities. Factory farms create public health hazards such as antibiotic-resistant bacteria due to the overuse of antibiotics in livestock, as well as water polluted with nitrates, microbes, and other harmful chemicals. Despite the clear need for greater worker protection and oversight to mitigate the environmental harms of these practices, factory farms are notoriously difficult to regulate. Industrial animal operations are located predominantly in rural areas, often next to poor communities and communities of color. Food companies have driven independent producers nearly to extinction, sapped the economic vitality of rural communities, and amassed sweeping political influence at both the state and national levels to effectively prevent mitigation efforts. Essays in this volume cover pertinent topics such as the history, structure, and trends in the factory farming industry; water and air pollution; infectious disease health effects; community and social impacts; environmental justice and sustainable agriculture; and the impacts of COVID-19 among meatpacking workers.

Local Food Environments: Food Access in America provides information on the complex nature of food delivery systems as well as the historical and political trends that have shaped them over time. The book presents the empirical evidence demonstrating disparities in access to healthy affordable foods across the United States and how these disparities may explain food consumption patterns for some Americans as well as potential risks for diet-related illness. The book describes the current body of research surrounding these associations and presents the methodological issues pertinent to this area of public health. Evidence from these studies is placed in context of current and past American food policies that have supported the existing food retail market including the production and retailing of foods and ways in which the consolidation of the food system has affected Americans. Research conducted regarding local food environments in Canada has also been included as a point of comparison. Methods are discussed as well as the current state of knowledge regarding factors associated with disparities between local food environments, the effect of these disparities on the diets of residents within those communities, and the impact that local food environments have on diet-related health outcomes, such as obesity. Also described are solutions garnered to minimize local food environment inequalities currently being conducted by federal, state, and local government agencies. Although this book focuses on US local food environments, similar issues regarding access to food are concurrently taking place outside of the US. In all chapters, readers are encouraged to critically consider the current research methods as well as recent programs and policies that aim to address local food environments.

The protest against meat eating may turn out to be one of the most significant movements of our age. In terms of our relations with animals, it is difficult to think of a more urgent moral problem than the fate of billions of animals killed every year for human consumption. This book argues that vegetarians and vegans are not only protestors, but also moral pioneers. It provides 25 chapters which stimulate further thought, exchange, and reflection on the morality of eating meat. A rich array of philosophical, religious, historical, cultural, and practical approaches challenge our assumptions about animals and how we should relate to them. This book provides global perspectives with insights from 11 countries: US, UK, Germany, France, Belgium, Israel, Austria, the Netherlands, Canada, South Africa, and Sweden. Focusing on food consumption practices, it critically foregrounds and unpacks key ethical rationales that underpin vegetarian and vegan lifestyles. It invites us to revisit our relations with animals as food, and as subjects of exploitation, suggesting that there are substantial moral, economic, and environmental reasons for changing our habits. This timely contribution, edited by two of the leading experts within the field, offers a rich array of interdisciplinary insights on what ethical vegetarianism and veganism means. It will be of great interest to those studying and researching in the fields of animal geography and animal-studies, sociology, food studies and consumption, environmental studies, and cultural studies. This book will be of great appeal to animal protectionists, environmentalists, and humanitarians.