Eating is not only an essential individual necessity, but also a multi-layered social phenomenon and a crucial political issue. According to the French sociologist and ethnologist Marcel Mauss it can, therefore, be described as a “social total phenomenon”. The Nazis were definitely well aware of this fact and did everything ...
(Show more)Eating is not only an essential individual necessity, but also a multi-layered social phenomenon and a crucial political issue. According to the French sociologist and ethnologist Marcel Mauss it can, therefore, be described as a “social total phenomenon”. The Nazis were definitely well aware of this fact and did everything to ensure at least a minimal nutrition standard for each German citizen in order to strengthen the foundations of their dictatorship. In this context the so-called “Eintopfsonntage” (“stew Sundays”) that were introduced on 1 October 1933 had to serve a triple purpose: Besides the nutritional aspect of “governmental catering” they also – and foremost – were meant as an appropriate propagandistic symbol for the Nazi approach of providing social welfare on the one hand and social disciplining by “public dining” on the other hand. Thus (at first sight completely innocent) socializing became easily connected with obedience and control – remarkably enough, without acts of obvious violence and terror on the part of the state in this case.
But the chapter of “stew Sundays” in the Third Reich, however, is still unwritten. Hence some of the central questions the paper wants to deal with are the following ones:
• What does the concept of “political culinarism” mean and to what respect can it be made applicable for a better understanding of National Socialism?
• How exactly did the Nazis perform “governmental catering” and “public dining” on “stew Sundays” and what were the reactions within German society?
• What were the ideological intensions as well as the practical achievements of the “stew Sundays” with regard to the establishment and consolidation of the Nazi state?
In order to examine the concept of “political culinarism” on the example of “stew Sundays” in Nazi Germany more detailed, the paper is planned to be arranged as follows:
1.) Introduction
2.) Nazism and nutrition – Theoretical reflections upon the concept of “political culinarism” regarding National Socialism
3.) Digestion and dictatorship – “Stew Sundays” between propagandistic spectacle and political instrument
4.) Conclusion
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