Food: Cool or Uncool? (The trajectory of Maggi)
Culture is ubiquitous, and penetrates everything. One would think that a realm like food would be untouched by cultural biases and hegemonies. One would be incorrect in this presumption. In the youth culture of today, certain food items are essentially deemed "cool" and "uncool", of high culture or of low culture. This forms a hierarchical structure that is not vertical but rather horizontal. Let me explain. The bhakri (jowar bread) as a food item can be perceived as uncool by a certain aspirational neo-liberal youth born in the world where KFC is cool. This, however, goes backwards when we go further in this circular hierarchy where a more privileged, the higher cultural elite will perceive KFC as uncool and re-brand the bhakri as a "jowar delight" and "an integral part of a balanced diet." Looking at this from another example, we go from collecting milk from the cow for consumption to bagging this milk for mass distribution to franchising and...