Food Media Final, E. Farrar

Monique Alden Final Project Paper August 4, 2017 Final Project Reflection Imagine you are in a waiting room at the doctor’s office. On the low, glass table in front of you there is a stack of outdated magazines: Vogue from 2 seasons ago, Us (What Did Brad Do to Angelina This Time?), and maybe a crossword booklet already filled out by a former patient. And throw in a box of tissues too. After scanning the disappointing array of entertainment stuffs, next—I would assume—you pull out your phone. And I would also assume (if you’re a millennial) that you open Instagram. I know I certainly would.

Instagram is an interesting platform. Interesting, indeed for it is nothing more than a scroll feed of everything you’re not doing at the moment. You’re not waterskiing in Jamaica, or tanning on the beach in Mykonos. You’re not at the top of a wonderful view, or meeting the president, and you probably don’t look good enough, in that moment, for a selfie. You’re sitting and waiting in a doctor’s office—the least glamorous thing you could be doing at the moment and only those who feel the need for constant social interaction, post about that experience. Instagram is only filled with the edited version of the best-of-the-best. It’s not even a platform for #nofilter because people only want to see the incredible.

I confess: I had a food Instagram (no, I never called it a food “Insta”). I called it the_littlefoodie and I gained 13,000 followers, and no, I did not purchase them. I will

admit, I was guilty of stopping dinners to snag a pic. I went to specific restaurants to get ahead of the craze and gather likes as though I were scavenging for berries. Every like was precious. I sometimes even made food just to photograph it, only to throw it away. I became obsessed; I checked it every few minutes and never had a meal without my phone in hand. But after a year, I started to feel like a scam. What was I getting from it? I got some free food (sometimes). It was always exciting when people would hand me their phone to look at a picture of a sloppy burger, or a deliciously melting ice cream cone, and it turned out to be my photo they were drooling over. But realistically, I was providing no service to the world. The food industry was failing and here I was, snapping pictures as if everything were fine and dandy, as if food wasn’t being constantly thrown out, overproduced, monocultured and GMO’d. I bet no one would want to look at pictures of that.

And so, I abandoned the_littlefoodie. I left her to rot in her virtual space. My follower base dropped off, one by one, until 13,000 turned to 12,000 and down to 11,000.

I felt embarrassed when I went out to eat and people asked what happened to her. But eventually I lost my title. I hoped in doing so, I would gain a little more respect in the food world.

But one day, I began to wonder: why let a large follower-base go to waste? I was still using the_littlefoodie on my resume as some sort of proof of expertise (iPhone photographer?). And so I decided I would bring her back, but only under the pretence that I would not be whoring-out food for likes. I wanted to use the experiences in this class as my catalyst for the new-and-improved little foodie. On our trips to Arthur Avenue and Eat OffBeat I snapped pictures hoping to show people a different side of food. I took a photo

of a Nepalese refugee named Rachana and posted a short bio along with her photo. I posted a photo of a meat and cheese shop in the Bronx. I posted strange, overly saturated and double-exposed photos of retro restaurant shelving, and skewed cinnamon rolls. But for some reason, these posts were not getting the same attention as the over-saturated photos I previously posted. People aren’t interested in the behind-the-scenes, or the overtly obscure.

This brings me to the concept of capital. Certain “food people” carry with them a particular amount and a particular type of capital. For example, Alice Waters carries a lot of intellectual capital in regards to food. She is also highly respected in the field due to all her work with food education and sustainability. Jonathan Gold is Los Angeles’s favorite critic. But aside from the fame that these big players hold, they also have cultural, economic, and social. However, I’d like to shift the focus away from the keepers of capital and explore how knowing about these keepers can also grant capital. Someone who is well educated on the subject of food and frequents references to Lucy Long, Michael Pollan, and Claude Levi Strauss alike, exhibits a certain level of intellectual capacity and know-how that grants both social and cultural capital. Cultural capital is defined in the form of education and intellectual skill, whereas social capital is whom you know or personal resources you have access to that connect you to (important) people.

This brings me to Instagram. The app is a platform that connects people to people, hence its title as a social media. Through this platform, we are free to post as we wish.

We seek capital. We want to be a part of the greater picture in a significant way and thus seek to be recognized by others as important. Instagram is an outlet that allows us to exhibit aspects of ours lives that deem us important. The photos one finds on Instagram

are usually one out of one hundred taken—the best one. It is a small snippet into the wonderful lives of the mostly mundane who are simply seeking easy capital (commonly referred to, today, as “validation”). However, what people are truly looking for is to feel as though what they have to offer is worth other people’s time and consideration. In order to follow someone on Instagram, you have to care what that person posts about. The more followers you have, the more people care about you (or so the formula goes).

This brings me back to my original dilemma: when it came to my food Instagram page, people didn’t care about other aspects of food; they only wanted the “foodporn.”

This can be explained in terms of capital. Someone who is taking pictures of food (exceptional-looking food), is not only showing the food, but is also showing that they have the means to eat at that place. In order to eat out, one must have the money to do so —especially if one is eating out as frequently as a food Instagrammer hence, economic capital. The food Instagram itself is an exhibition of that unless, of course, the Instagrammer is only showing pictures of his or her home-cooked food in which case, we would be discussing a different form of capital (cultural capital for it would be an expression of education and access). The Instagrammer is also exhibiting forms of social and cultural capital. She knows the hip places to eat, the “hotspots.” She is trendsetting and is therefore an authority on what’s cool. But what happens when the “cool girl” switches her view and is now focused on a different subject? If the authority switches views do the followers follow? Not necessarily (when it comes to Instagram).

People want to see what they originally signed on for. If they follow you, then they expect to get what they followed. If you switch your view, then people no longer care about what you have to offer unless you switch your follower base. It’s simple

marketing. In order for my new-and-improved Instagram to become popular once more, I would need to seek out a different following. The people that follow me are not interested in food as art, food as struggle, food as reality because that is not at the forefront of their interests. In a way, I lose my capital with one group yet, I can gain it with another. But that is why Instagram is as popular as it is. It is any form of capital at any time simply depending on the group you choose to interact with. People want capital; they need it.

Today, we are addicted to capital and can earn it with the simple click of a button.

“Like” is no longer simply a preference of taste, it’s an affirmation that you are worth something. People like what you have posted and therefore, they like you. However, in reality, this simply is not true, which is why we have become a generation that hides behind screens. Conversation is too difficult because we fear we will be disliked (Have you ever wondered why there is no “dislike” button on Instagram?). Face-to-face interaction barrels down the wall that social media provides because we cannot edit realtime. But we have become so sensitive to the idea of being disliked that we would prefer not to interact with the possibility and so we pretend on media feeds that our lives are perfect sunsets, medium-rare cheeseburgers, and beautifully melting ice cream.