From flesh to food: exploring consumers’ fluctuations in hysteresis

Steadman, C., Medway, D., de Jong, A. and Varley, P. (2023) From flesh to food: exploring consumers’ fluctuations in hysteresis. Marketing Theory, (doi: 10.1177/14705931231160835) (Early Online Publication)

Abstract

Bourdieu’s interrelated concepts of habitus and field have been deployed to theorise the unreflexive consumption practices characterising much of consumers’ everyday lives. Less is known, however, about the disruptive experience when habitus and field suddenly misalign – which Bourdieu terms ‘hysteresis’. We address this lacuna by studying smalahove (sheep’s head) consumption involving participant observation at a Norwegian smalahove farm – an unsettling space within the food consumption field that may challenge many consumers’ habitual ways of seeing, smelling, hearing, touching, and tasting meat. Our core contribution lies in introducing a dynamic conceptualisation of hysteresis, demonstrating how it fluctuates in consumption environments; intensifying and diminishing in intensity as the gaps between habitus and field open and close.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Early Online Publication
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: de Jong, Dr Anna
• Authors: Steadman, C., Medway, D., de Jong, A., and Varley, P.
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Social & Environmental Sustainability
• Journal Name: Marketing Theory
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• ISSN: 1470-5931
• ISSN (Online): 1741-301X
• Published Online: 01 March 2023
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © The Author(s) 2023
• First Published: First published in Marketing Theory 2023
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons license