Anthony's Presentation: Hunger, Malnutrition and Poverty in the United States, Some Observations on Their Social and Cultural Context

Hunger, Malnutrition and Poverty in the United States, Some Observations on Their Social and Cultural Context
Janet M. Fitchen



From the outside looking in, Americans tend to think hunger does not exist and that government food projects and stamps do reach the majority of the hungry. The "Steak Effect" - people who are hungry can buy steak or other branded foods with stamps. That contributes to overall mentality that there is not a hunger problem. The media portrays hunger as kids with matchstick legs in Ethiopia - but do not show how dismal conditions can be for Americans.

She discusses hunger and poverty which go hand in hand, especially in the USA, as we have no shortage of food. Disproportionally affected populations are women headed households, native american families on reservations (who take the brunt of poverty) - it is interesting to note that children are more affected, as 15% of households in the USA are below the poverty line, but these contain 20% of the children. (This is a statistic from 1984 to 1985).

Culturally unique aspects to USA hunger: people in the USA, especially the urban poor, are not likely to use hunting/farming/gathering (not that you can). No traditional food availability in the wild. People rarely have things in their kitchen for food and survive primarily on snacks. People below the poverty line tend to subsist on junk food. There are lots of different reasons why that happens.


Uneven distribution of food within households - who makes the money or goes to work gets more of the food. Unwillingness to let children feel deprived - with second generation and third generation poverty line families, they remember being told "there's no food" and are more likely to cave into children and buy cheap junk food. When kid asks for some commercial junk food, they will remember not being allowed to have it and buy.

Family effect: when there is no food, people are not happy. If you take an already stressful or tense family relationship, a lack of food makes things worse. People tend to eat finger/fun foods due to advertising effect - people want what they see on TV or status foods. Checking out at grocery - you do not want to seem like someone who cannot afford their own food. People prefer status foods like steak or even junk. (We are a normal American family and can choose our food). This has to do with view of poverty from the outside: upper or middle class people think poor should only buy staple foods, which just compels the poor not to do so.

Conclusion statement: the rich buy steak and the poor get cheese. The bad societal effects of how the rich view the poor severely affects buying patterns of poor people.