Vol.:(0123456789)
Information Technology & Tourism
https://doi.org/10.1007/s40558-018-0117-8
1 3
BOOK REVIEW
Tanja Schneider, Karin Eli, Catherine Dolan, and Stanley
Ulijaszek (editors): Digital food activism
ISBN 978-1-138-08832-0 (Hardcover); 978-1-315-10993-0 (e-Book).
Routledge, London and New York, 2018, 252 pp. USD140 (Hardcover);
USD48.25 (eBook)
Irene Cheng Chu Chan
1
· Rob Law
1
Received: 3 July 2018 / Accepted: 3 August 2018
© Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2018
Edited by Schneider, Eli, Dolan, and Ulijaszek, Digital Food Activism is a collec-
tion of 11 outstanding works dedicated to investigating how digital media technol-
ogies transform food activism and consumerism in food systems. The book does
not intend to address all research questions related to digital food activism, but it
ofers an extensive overview on the topic and sets the ground for future research.
In Chapter 1, the editors introduces the novel concept of “digital food activism,”
which emerges from the overlap of “food activism” and “digital activism”. Having
reviewed the existing literature on digitally enabled food activism, the editors iden-
tify the gap that the current volume intends to fll. In Chapter 2, Caldwell discusses
the role of digital technology in food-oriented social progress initiatives. Drawing
on an on-going ethnographic study, Caldwell analyzes examples of food transgres-
sion and disruption, which seek to reframe and redefne food experiences. She also
shows how food disruption can change the presumed relationships between prob-
lems and solutions pertinent to social justice.
In Chapter 3, McLennan, Ulijaszek, and Beguerisse-Díaz attempt to understand
the sociocultural patterns in digital food activism by examining the contents related
to diabetes in Twitter. They explore the most infuential users on Twitter, and the
most common content that they disseminate which includes news, health informa-
tion, commercial, and social interaction. The authors concluded from food-related
jokes and banter that user-generated digital food activism can be in many diferent
forms. Chapter 4 is dedicated to cofee and the issue of uneven power between pro-
ducers and consumers even with digital platforms. Using the research data collected
* Irene Cheng Chu Chan
irene.cc.chan@connect.polyu.hk
Rob Law
rob.law@polyu.edu.hk
1
School of Hotel and Tourism Management, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom,
Kowloon, Hong Kong, China