Vegetarianism, Meat and Modernity in India

Johan Fischer is Associate Professor in the Department of Social Sciences and Business, Roskilde University, Denmark. His work focuses on human values and markets. More specifically, he explores the interfaces between class, consumption, market relations, religion and the state in a globalized world. He is the author of numerous books, articles in journals and edited volumes. He is editor of the Routledge book series Material Religion and Spirituality and is on the editorial boards of the journals International Journal of Asia Pacific Studies, Contemporary Islam and Research in Globalization. Currently, he is working on a research project on vegetarianism and meat-eating in a global perspective.

'Dietary shifts away from meat are seen to align with improvements in agricultural sustainability, climate change-related emissions reductions, human health, and wellbeing of animals. In the Indian case they also represent a cultural fusion of nationalism with religion. Read Fischer’s systematic and careful study for deeper insights into what makes for diet transformations. This enduring contribution brilliantly highlights the structures and drivers that yield dietary persistence vs. change, with a direct focus on vegetarianism in India.' - Arun Agrawal, Professor, School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan.'Written by a seasoned ethnographer of religion and markets, this is a multi-sited and multi-scaled dissection of cosmopolitan middle-class food culture in Hyderabad and of the production-distribution-regulation system through which it’s provisioned. Fischer offers a carefully grounded social analysis of many paradoxes and contradictions in the world’s leading vegetarian nation. Both vegetarianism and meat-eating are festooned in scientised claims about health and nutrition but both communicate enduring social meanings and dietary norms. This should be essential reading for anyone interested in human values and markets, especially for food.' - Barbara Harriss-White, FAcSS, Emeritus Professor and Fellow, Wolfson College, Oxford University.'In this important book Fischer shows the political significance of controversies around vegetarianism and meat consumption in India. The Hindu nationalist myth that India is a vegetarian civilization is belied by the increasing popularity of meat, especially among middle classes. In his ethnography Fischer focuses on the contradictory realities of Hyderabad in South India. A must read for anyone interested in the politics of vegetarianism in India.' - Peter van der Veer, Emeritus Director of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity.' … there is much to be learnt from Vegetarianism, Meat and Modernity in India about the actors and processes that shape India’s fast-changing food ways in contradictory ways, and with global ramifications.' - Kenneth Bo Nielsen, Journal of Contemporary Asia

• 1. Veg or Non-veg? Transformations in Retail and Consumption and the Rise of “Meat Modernity” in the Age of the Green 2. Setting the Scene: The Publics and Politics of Green and Brown Labels 3. Markets: Manufacturing and Selling Veg and Non-Veg Commodities 4. Consuming Veg and Non-Veg Foods 5. ‘Good Life’ Clubs: Of Students, Dalits, and Vegans Between Meat Modernity and the Second Green Revolution 6. Conclusions and Broader Perspectives