The following bibliography is not only a list of the many great readings that I have found, but also readings that my group members Kimberly Ostrander and Ashley Approvato have found as well. Through our collaborative project, we have used some of the following sources.
Annotated Bibliography
1. Berry, Wendell.
"The Pleasures of Eating." Education for Sustainability
| Center for Ecoliteracy. 1990. Web. 28 Mar. 2011. <http://www.ecoliteracy.org/essays/pleasures-eating>.
An online publication about a book that author Wendell Berry wrote in 1990. The book mentions how most consumers do not know how their food is prepared before they buy them in stores. Also, depending on what goes into the food or how it is handled may differ prices from one product to another. Many people do not even want to know how their food is handled because they do not want to even think about the ways in which animals could have been abused or what they could have been fed. He believes that we should remember how food used to be prepared back in the day and that we should take control of how our food is prepared by being aware and even growing your own garden.
Berry's article was one of my favorite readings because I believe that it really opened my eyes to the topic. I am one who used to "hid my eyes" because I didn't want to know how my meat was being handled. I know that animals have been used for food for, pretty much forever but I have an extreme soft side with animals and I usually try to pretend that I am not eating these animals.
2. Brown, Cynthia Stokes. "Chapter 3." Like It Was: The Complete Guide to Oral History. New York, NY: Teachers and Writers Collaborative, 1988. 31-49.Print.
“Like it was” is a book geared towards, high school students and above, teachers who want to teach about oral history, and any person who picks up the book can learn how to record the right way. For a while, oral history was not something taught in schools because of the expense of having a recorder. By the 60’s tape recorders had become accessible and allowed many people to record historical events that we can listen to or remember today. Before World War II, most of the stories that were recorded were from those who were wealthy and not from the average person. After the war, “history is now open to everyone.” People’s whose voices have never been heard (prisoners, young children, slaves, immigrants, workers) were able to tell those who were not present at that time, how life was for them.
Although we can try our best, we can never completely write an accurate account because each person has a different view or was in a different situation than the next. Not only would oral history benefit our class and us as students, it affects those around us and those who we are questioning.
The following are a few reasons as to why we should want to write oral history which are taken from the book:
3. Clandin, D. Jean, and F. Michael Connely. Narrative Inquiry Experience and Story in Qualitative Research. First. San Francisco: lossey-Bass Inc, 2000. Print.
At the beginning of the article, the author mentions how he is not necessarily trying to define what narrative inquiry is but is trying to explain it with examples. At the end of the article, I found some really interesting quotes that I think sum up what the author is trying to say. The first one is: "As we worked within our three-dimensional spaces as narrative inquirers, what became clear to us was that as inquirers we meet ourselves in the past, the present, and the future. What we mean by this is that we tell remembered stories of ourselves from earlier times as well as more current stories.All of these stories offer possible plot lines for our futures." I find that many of my plots or ideas for writings usually stem from past or present experiences that I have had and as far as my twitterive goes, it is a story about my future in a way. A second quote that I found interesting was "As narrative inquirers, we share our writing on a work-in-progress basis with response communities. By this, we mean that we ask others to read our work and to respond in ways that help us see other meanings that might lead to further retelling." This is an example of what is occurring in our classroom right now. As writers were are asking the class to respond to our twitterives with questions that might lead us to retelling our stories or adding on to them. Finally, "as narrative inquirers we work within the space not only with our participants but also with ourselves " meaning
4. Fontaine, Sheryll I., and Susan M. Hunter. Collaborative Writing in Composition Studies. Thomson Wadsworth, 2006. Print.
This piece of writing was broken up into two different chapters that looked at three different parts in collaborative writing. The first chapter had numerous scenarios to put the reader into. It asked questions about "How would you feel?" and "Remember a time where you overheard two different family members recalling the same story. How were they different?" The authors talk about how listening to conversations is really important and that there is always a little change in the story being told from one person to the next. Listening to others talk is really important because you never know when someone's words or advice can help you come up with an idea or possibly give you the idea for something that you never would have thought of on your own. The second chapter (Chapter 3) talked about how different it is going from being an independent writing to collaborating with others. You should split the work of evenly, all agree on what the tone of the writer should be, and then come back together to talk about the information that each person has come up with. "Lunsford and Ede would categorize such a collaborative experience as "hierarchical"; that is, it is organized in a linear fashion, structured by the roles of each participant, and driven by the goal of accomplishing a particularly defined task " (27). By having people from a group come together to collaborate once in a while throughout the writing process and then at the end come back to put all of their independent ideas together as the end project, the group can be labeled as being "cooperative" as opposed to "collaborative".
5. Schnieder, Stephen. Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of the Slow Food Movement. 4. 70. 2008. Print.
Although the Slow Food movement has been growing its popularity over the past few years, the movement itself has been around for a while. It actually started in the 1970’s in Italy where it emerged from the political and social environment. Although there has been popularity over turning towards organic foods and eating from local farms, the Slow Food movement had also been moving in that direction before this topic became so popular.
I have seen the popularity recently with organic foods and the popularity of eating from local farms. Until reading this article, I had no idea that the Slow Food movement had been developing in that direction long before organic foods became so popular. I feel that it is important to look back on ideas that have been developing for a while, such as the Slow Food movement for advice for how people should be eating.
6. Schlosser, Eric. "Fast Food Nation." New York Times. (2000): Print.
The author of this article talks about how most people are desensitized to the food that they eat and how fast food has taken over our lives as a means of “fast” food. Most people have a hard time escaping fast food because it has become such a vital part to most people’s diets when people do not have enough time to fix something better for their selves. Some people mention how eating fast food is a lot cheaper than going to the store and buying healthy food and although sometimes that is true, the amount of money you spend on fast food that is unhealthy could be put towards healthier food from the market.
7. Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin Press, 2006. 1-36. Print
"As a culture we seem to have arrived at a place where whatever native wisdom we may once have possessed about eating has been replaced by confusion and anxiety." Michael Pollan starts off this story trying to figure out why we have let others tell us where or what we should eat. We are allowing companies to alter the way in which we are eating when we should take the wisdom that we all once had about food. Pollan shows us how food trends have changed over time and how people will believe that every diet works and will continue to try each one until something works for them. The Atkins diet, which allows you to eat as much and often as you want as long as you stay away from carbs such as bread and pasta, has altered the way diets are supposed to be. There are so many different kinds of diets and projects that are out for the public to approach and supermarkets are milking them for all the are worth. Supermarkets will carry meals related to name brand diets not for the consumers sake, but more for their own advantage. Consumers need to realize where all of our food actually comes from and not just believe that it comes from the store only. We all know that it was shipped to the market but shouldn't we care where it came from and how it was handled? Food needs to stop being "altered" and it needs to be taken properly without the help of science.
8. Qualley, Donna. Turns of Thought: Teaching Composition as Reflexive Inquiry. Portsmouth: Boynton, 1997. 2-32. Print
This was a collection of one teacher’s journey through writing and how the different writings shaped the way in which people write. She also talks about how she learned from her students while in turn they were learning from her. She realized that she learned the process of narrative writing through her own experiences and lessons learned. When she says "reflexive" doesn't necessarily mean "reflective". By saying reflexive she means "the act of turning back to discover,examine, and critique one's claims and assumptions in response to an encounter with another idea, text, person, or culture." To me, the difference between the two is that when a person reflects on their actions, they are just thinking of their selves and not worrying about anything besides their actions. On the other hand, being reflexive is a "two way street" where you learn your actions and then turn around and use them in order to look at something differently.
9. Dinstel, Roxie. Interpreting Food Labels Isn't Always Easy. Fairbanks Daily News. 2001.
"One-third of all new food and beverage products launched in 2009 made “natural” claims, according to the Mintel Global New Products Database. This increase in “natural” foods has people believing these products are health foods and even has some believing it has magical powers." When we go to stores, how do we know what to shop for and which foods are actually "natural" and better for us? Roxie Dinstel talks about how reading food labels can get so confusing but if you just follow a few simple steps, buying good foods for your family can get easier. She mentions that ingredients are listed in descending order so as a consumer you can read the ingredients and realize how much of something is in your food. She also mentions how whole grains are better so be sure to look for foods that have whole grains or whole wheat in them. Finally, reading the nutrition label on food products can give you an idea of what it is them and you can easily compare products based on the nutrition label.
10. FDA. Growing Number Of People Read Food Labels. Opposing Views. 2010.
More than half (54 percent) of consumers said they read a product's label the first time they buy the product. That's a 10 percent increase from 2002.
-- Among those who in 2008 reported they read the nutrition label the first time they buy a product
-- two-thirds use the label “often” to check how high or low a food is in calories and in substances such as salt, vitamins, and fat.
Throughout this article conducted by the FDA, it seems as though consumers are beginning to read food labels more often and sometimes even read them twice in order to figure out what exactly is in their foods. The article also shows that some 46% believe that every label they are reading is true while over 50% of consumers are undecided and are skeptical on whether to believe that everything they read on the food labels are accurate.
11. Donovan, Travis Walter. 9 Most Misleading Food Labels. Huffington Post. 2010. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/20/9-most-misleading-food-la_n_538868.html#s81241&title=Fiber
The nine most misleading food labels consist of probably the most sought out words that consumers looks for in products. The first is "All natural" which is not reliable at all. The FDA has vague rules about what can be identified as all natural so most products are labeled all natural so more consumers purchase them (which seems to have been been working out for them). "All Natural" is not a label enforced strictly enough at this point to be trusted." Some may actually be better than other products but for the most part, don't give into all natural because majority of the companies are lying. O grams transfat is another misleading food label that needs to be carefully viewd. “0g Trans Fat” is highlighted on the front of many products by using bold imagery, sometimes with banners and exclamation points. This distraction draws attention from the fact that many of these products are extremely high in saturated fat, misleading the consumer into believing they are buying a healthy product. One very misleading label is "made with real fruit". Although some products are, not all are. If you go to buy a product that says that it is made with real fruit, in order to find out if that is true or not, look in the ingredients and see if the fruit of the product is in the first four items listed. If not, then the product does not have any real fruit in it. This website made a statement as to why they have produced this article: We believe in helping consumers make good choices about what they are eating, for themselves and the environment. Unfortunately, many food companies use labels that have little or no meaning to obscure the truth about what's ACTUALLY in our food." It's so nice to know that there are researches out there who are actually looking out for the health of consumers and not just trying to help the companies make money.
12. Decoding Food Labels. CBS News. Youtube video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yydk_vmhR4c
A woman named Katie Lee visits Harry Smith on the CBS News morning show and talks to him about the differences in food labels. She talks about the differences between "free range" and "free roaming" and many other confusing food labels. Being that the organic industry is booming very quickly, new terms are continuously introduced to consumers in order to persuade them into buying their products over another companies products. Katie Lee mentions that there are some vegetables that you should really buy organically because some of them hold all of the pesticides in them while other fruits and vegetables are able to release them. Vegetables such as carrots and lettuce should be bought organically because they will hold in all of the pesticides which will then be inserted into your body. Fruits such as pineapple can be bought without being organic because the outside of the fruit is so thick that it will not hold any of the pesticides and will not endanger your health.
13. What Does "All Natural" Really Mean. Fave Diets Blog.2009. http://www.favedietsblog.com/what-does-all-natural-really-mean/
Writer Mindy, talks about how all natural does not really mean what it says. Many restaurants and companies are labeling their products "all natural" in hopes to sway consumers towards their products over others that do not have "all natural" written on them. "The FDA mandates that foods labeled “all natural” contain no artificial sweeteners or colors and no artificial flavors. The FDA defines natural flavors as anything derived “from a spice, fruit or fruit juice, vegetable or vegetable juice, edible yeast, herb, bark, bud, root, leaf.” However, all natural does not mean "organic". Although most companies are saying that their food is not "man made" it does not necessarily mean that there were no pesticides used while the product was growing. It is important to understand exactly what all natural consists of so consumers such as ourselves do not get sucked into the "all natural' phase if it is really not what we think it is.
14. FDA. The Food Label and You. Youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg6ru8XatGo
This award winning video produced by the FDA takes you into a food market and introduces you to the different labels and names that can be found throughout all markets all over the country. If you are not sure whether reduced fat or low fat is better, you should compare the two by looking on the back of their labels. If you want the healthier one, you should choose the product that is low in fact, rather than reduced fat. Looking on the nutrition facts on the back of the product can allow you to look at numerous things. One thing that you should look for is the serving size for each product. It tells you about how many servings that product holds. Although it may only say that there are 5grams of fat in a serving of cookies, it is important to realize that it is for only one serving. Sometimes the portion size may be 11, therefore the nutrition facts change if you were to eat more than three cookies.
15. Mayo Clinic. Organic Foods: Are they safer? More Nutritious?Mayo Clinic Website. http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/organic-food/NU00255
The staff from Mayo Clinic, a medical clinic that has advice online, introduces the differences between organic foods and those foods that are not considered organic. Their goal for you is to "Learn the difference between organic foods and their traditionally grown counterparts. Decide which is best for you, considering nutrition, quality, taste, cost and other factors." The word "organic" refers to the way in which a particular food item has been grown and picked. "Organic farming practices are designed to encourage soil and water conservation and reduce pollution. Farmers who grow organic produce and meat don't use conventional methods to fertilize, control weeds or prevent livestock disease." The website provides a diagram which shows the differences between organic produce and conventional produce. Some of the differences include: organic farmers give animals organic feed and allow them access to the outdoors. Use preventive measures — such as rotational grazing, a balanced diet and clean housing — to help minimize disease as opposed to conventional farmers who give animals antibiotics, growth hormones and medications to prevent disease and spur growth. It is also very important to look for the USDA symbol on any organic foods. This shows that the food item is a 100% organic as opposed to other food items that may be only partially organic. Although most people assume that organic means completely organic, they are wrong. In order for something to be 100% organic is different standards from a product just being considered "organic"
16. Certified Organic Label Guide. Organic.org. http://www.organic.org/articles/showarticle/article-201
This website is designed for consumers to read and understand the USDA significance of organic labels. The website wants to help consumers make sense of organic labeling, although it can be difficult, and teach many consumers who do not understand the significance of the USDA Organic label. Since October 21, 2002, guidelines have been created by the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Organic Program (NOP) to assure consumers know the exact organic content of the food they buy. Products which are labeled100% Organic are foods made with 100% organic ingredients and may display the USDA Organic seal.Products labeled Organic are "products that contain at least 95–99% organic ingredients (by weight). The remaining ingredients are not available organically but have been approved by the NOP. These products may display the USDA Organic seal".The website also tells you to keep in mind that even if a producer is certified organic, the use of the USDA Organic label is voluntary. At the same time, not everyone goes through the rigorous process of becoming certified, especially smaller farming operations.
17. Cevallos, Marissa. Dieters Find 'Healthy' Food Labels Can Be Tricky. Los Angeles Times. http://articles.latimes.com/2011/apr/21/news/la-heb-dieter-label-20110421
Consumers who are looking for 'healthy' food may be more easily fooled than those who are not dieting. "In one of several similar experiments, researchers from the University of South Carolina found that dieters were more likely to rate a pasta dish as healthful if it was labeled as a salad." By changing the names of different food dishes, restaurants and food chains are easily able to shape the view on the consumers mind and trick them into thinking that the food is healthier than it really is. A group of dieters and non dieters were asked if a specific food was considered 'healthy' or not. By changing the name of the meal from "pasta" to " salad", more than half of the people interviewed felt that the "salad" was considered healthy while the same meal with the name "pasta" was proven to be termed unhealthy. This just goes to show that restaurants and products can change the name of their products in order to get more consumers buying their products without actually making the product any healthier than it was.
18. Adams, Mike. "All natural" claim on food labels is often deceptive; foods harbor hidden MSG and other unnatural ingredients. Natural News. 2005. http://www.naturalnews.com/005778.html
"When you're shopping for groceries, watch out for the phrase "all natural" as claimed on the front of various product packages. It turns out that the phrase "all natural" can mean just about anything; it actually has no nutritional meaning whatsoever and isn't truly regulated by the FDA." This is something that many food researchers are coming across and although this is working its way out into the public, the companies are not changing the 'all natural' on their products. By definition, anything that is made from 'natural resources' can be considered natural and although a product may use natural ingredients, its the way that the product is produced is what is unnatural about the food. Although this may be the case, the producer of the product does not have to label how his product is made, therefore the product that you just purchased is 'all natural'.
An online publication about a book that author Wendell Berry wrote in 1990. The book mentions how most consumers do not know how their food is prepared before they buy them in stores. Also, depending on what goes into the food or how it is handled may differ prices from one product to another. Many people do not even want to know how their food is handled because they do not want to even think about the ways in which animals could have been abused or what they could have been fed. He believes that we should remember how food used to be prepared back in the day and that we should take control of how our food is prepared by being aware and even growing your own garden.
Berry's article was one of my favorite readings because I believe that it really opened my eyes to the topic. I am one who used to "hid my eyes" because I didn't want to know how my meat was being handled. I know that animals have been used for food for, pretty much forever but I have an extreme soft side with animals and I usually try to pretend that I am not eating these animals.
2. Brown, Cynthia Stokes. "Chapter 3." Like It Was: The Complete Guide to Oral History. New York, NY: Teachers and Writers Collaborative, 1988. 31-49.Print.
“Like it was” is a book geared towards, high school students and above, teachers who want to teach about oral history, and any person who picks up the book can learn how to record the right way. For a while, oral history was not something taught in schools because of the expense of having a recorder. By the 60’s tape recorders had become accessible and allowed many people to record historical events that we can listen to or remember today. Before World War II, most of the stories that were recorded were from those who were wealthy and not from the average person. After the war, “history is now open to everyone.” People’s whose voices have never been heard (prisoners, young children, slaves, immigrants, workers) were able to tell those who were not present at that time, how life was for them.
Although we can try our best, we can never completely write an accurate account because each person has a different view or was in a different situation than the next. Not only would oral history benefit our class and us as students, it affects those around us and those who we are questioning.
The following are a few reasons as to why we should want to write oral history which are taken from the book:
- You would be helping to put the people into history who belong there. You would be learning the history that is not available anywhere or any other way.
- You would be serving the people you chose to interview and record.
- You would be explaining and celebrating your community’s values, presenting its history as seen from the inside.
- You would be learning about the moral decisions that people have to make.
- You would be meeting special, wonderful people with whom you might form a deep human bond.
- You would be honing your skills as a writer, which will enable you as an adult to play a more powerful role in creating history of your community and the world.
3. Clandin, D. Jean, and F. Michael Connely. Narrative Inquiry Experience and Story in Qualitative Research. First. San Francisco: lossey-Bass Inc, 2000. Print.
At the beginning of the article, the author mentions how he is not necessarily trying to define what narrative inquiry is but is trying to explain it with examples. At the end of the article, I found some really interesting quotes that I think sum up what the author is trying to say. The first one is: "As we worked within our three-dimensional spaces as narrative inquirers, what became clear to us was that as inquirers we meet ourselves in the past, the present, and the future. What we mean by this is that we tell remembered stories of ourselves from earlier times as well as more current stories.All of these stories offer possible plot lines for our futures." I find that many of my plots or ideas for writings usually stem from past or present experiences that I have had and as far as my twitterive goes, it is a story about my future in a way. A second quote that I found interesting was "As narrative inquirers, we share our writing on a work-in-progress basis with response communities. By this, we mean that we ask others to read our work and to respond in ways that help us see other meanings that might lead to further retelling." This is an example of what is occurring in our classroom right now. As writers were are asking the class to respond to our twitterives with questions that might lead us to retelling our stories or adding on to them. Finally, "as narrative inquirers we work within the space not only with our participants but also with ourselves " meaning
4. Fontaine, Sheryll I., and Susan M. Hunter. Collaborative Writing in Composition Studies. Thomson Wadsworth, 2006. Print.
This piece of writing was broken up into two different chapters that looked at three different parts in collaborative writing. The first chapter had numerous scenarios to put the reader into. It asked questions about "How would you feel?" and "Remember a time where you overheard two different family members recalling the same story. How were they different?" The authors talk about how listening to conversations is really important and that there is always a little change in the story being told from one person to the next. Listening to others talk is really important because you never know when someone's words or advice can help you come up with an idea or possibly give you the idea for something that you never would have thought of on your own. The second chapter (Chapter 3) talked about how different it is going from being an independent writing to collaborating with others. You should split the work of evenly, all agree on what the tone of the writer should be, and then come back together to talk about the information that each person has come up with. "Lunsford and Ede would categorize such a collaborative experience as "hierarchical"; that is, it is organized in a linear fashion, structured by the roles of each participant, and driven by the goal of accomplishing a particularly defined task " (27). By having people from a group come together to collaborate once in a while throughout the writing process and then at the end come back to put all of their independent ideas together as the end project, the group can be labeled as being "cooperative" as opposed to "collaborative".
5. Schnieder, Stephen. Good, Clean, Fair: The Rhetoric of the Slow Food Movement. 4. 70. 2008. Print.
Although the Slow Food movement has been growing its popularity over the past few years, the movement itself has been around for a while. It actually started in the 1970’s in Italy where it emerged from the political and social environment. Although there has been popularity over turning towards organic foods and eating from local farms, the Slow Food movement had also been moving in that direction before this topic became so popular.
I have seen the popularity recently with organic foods and the popularity of eating from local farms. Until reading this article, I had no idea that the Slow Food movement had been developing in that direction long before organic foods became so popular. I feel that it is important to look back on ideas that have been developing for a while, such as the Slow Food movement for advice for how people should be eating.
6. Schlosser, Eric. "Fast Food Nation." New York Times. (2000): Print.
The author of this article talks about how most people are desensitized to the food that they eat and how fast food has taken over our lives as a means of “fast” food. Most people have a hard time escaping fast food because it has become such a vital part to most people’s diets when people do not have enough time to fix something better for their selves. Some people mention how eating fast food is a lot cheaper than going to the store and buying healthy food and although sometimes that is true, the amount of money you spend on fast food that is unhealthy could be put towards healthier food from the market.
7. Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin Press, 2006. 1-36. Print
"As a culture we seem to have arrived at a place where whatever native wisdom we may once have possessed about eating has been replaced by confusion and anxiety." Michael Pollan starts off this story trying to figure out why we have let others tell us where or what we should eat. We are allowing companies to alter the way in which we are eating when we should take the wisdom that we all once had about food. Pollan shows us how food trends have changed over time and how people will believe that every diet works and will continue to try each one until something works for them. The Atkins diet, which allows you to eat as much and often as you want as long as you stay away from carbs such as bread and pasta, has altered the way diets are supposed to be. There are so many different kinds of diets and projects that are out for the public to approach and supermarkets are milking them for all the are worth. Supermarkets will carry meals related to name brand diets not for the consumers sake, but more for their own advantage. Consumers need to realize where all of our food actually comes from and not just believe that it comes from the store only. We all know that it was shipped to the market but shouldn't we care where it came from and how it was handled? Food needs to stop being "altered" and it needs to be taken properly without the help of science.
8. Qualley, Donna. Turns of Thought: Teaching Composition as Reflexive Inquiry. Portsmouth: Boynton, 1997. 2-32. Print
This was a collection of one teacher’s journey through writing and how the different writings shaped the way in which people write. She also talks about how she learned from her students while in turn they were learning from her. She realized that she learned the process of narrative writing through her own experiences and lessons learned. When she says "reflexive" doesn't necessarily mean "reflective". By saying reflexive she means "the act of turning back to discover,examine, and critique one's claims and assumptions in response to an encounter with another idea, text, person, or culture." To me, the difference between the two is that when a person reflects on their actions, they are just thinking of their selves and not worrying about anything besides their actions. On the other hand, being reflexive is a "two way street" where you learn your actions and then turn around and use them in order to look at something differently.
9. Dinstel, Roxie. Interpreting Food Labels Isn't Always Easy. Fairbanks Daily News. 2001.
"One-third of all new food and beverage products launched in 2009 made “natural” claims, according to the Mintel Global New Products Database. This increase in “natural” foods has people believing these products are health foods and even has some believing it has magical powers." When we go to stores, how do we know what to shop for and which foods are actually "natural" and better for us? Roxie Dinstel talks about how reading food labels can get so confusing but if you just follow a few simple steps, buying good foods for your family can get easier. She mentions that ingredients are listed in descending order so as a consumer you can read the ingredients and realize how much of something is in your food. She also mentions how whole grains are better so be sure to look for foods that have whole grains or whole wheat in them. Finally, reading the nutrition label on food products can give you an idea of what it is them and you can easily compare products based on the nutrition label.
10. FDA. Growing Number Of People Read Food Labels. Opposing Views. 2010.
More than half (54 percent) of consumers said they read a product's label the first time they buy the product. That's a 10 percent increase from 2002.
-- Among those who in 2008 reported they read the nutrition label the first time they buy a product
-- two-thirds use the label “often” to check how high or low a food is in calories and in substances such as salt, vitamins, and fat.
Throughout this article conducted by the FDA, it seems as though consumers are beginning to read food labels more often and sometimes even read them twice in order to figure out what exactly is in their foods. The article also shows that some 46% believe that every label they are reading is true while over 50% of consumers are undecided and are skeptical on whether to believe that everything they read on the food labels are accurate.
11. Donovan, Travis Walter. 9 Most Misleading Food Labels. Huffington Post. 2010. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/20/9-most-misleading-food-la_n_538868.html#s81241&title=Fiber
The nine most misleading food labels consist of probably the most sought out words that consumers looks for in products. The first is "All natural" which is not reliable at all. The FDA has vague rules about what can be identified as all natural so most products are labeled all natural so more consumers purchase them (which seems to have been been working out for them). "All Natural" is not a label enforced strictly enough at this point to be trusted." Some may actually be better than other products but for the most part, don't give into all natural because majority of the companies are lying. O grams transfat is another misleading food label that needs to be carefully viewd. “0g Trans Fat” is highlighted on the front of many products by using bold imagery, sometimes with banners and exclamation points. This distraction draws attention from the fact that many of these products are extremely high in saturated fat, misleading the consumer into believing they are buying a healthy product. One very misleading label is "made with real fruit". Although some products are, not all are. If you go to buy a product that says that it is made with real fruit, in order to find out if that is true or not, look in the ingredients and see if the fruit of the product is in the first four items listed. If not, then the product does not have any real fruit in it. This website made a statement as to why they have produced this article: We believe in helping consumers make good choices about what they are eating, for themselves and the environment. Unfortunately, many food companies use labels that have little or no meaning to obscure the truth about what's ACTUALLY in our food." It's so nice to know that there are researches out there who are actually looking out for the health of consumers and not just trying to help the companies make money.
12. Decoding Food Labels. CBS News. Youtube video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yydk_vmhR4c
A woman named Katie Lee visits Harry Smith on the CBS News morning show and talks to him about the differences in food labels. She talks about the differences between "free range" and "free roaming" and many other confusing food labels. Being that the organic industry is booming very quickly, new terms are continuously introduced to consumers in order to persuade them into buying their products over another companies products. Katie Lee mentions that there are some vegetables that you should really buy organically because some of them hold all of the pesticides in them while other fruits and vegetables are able to release them. Vegetables such as carrots and lettuce should be bought organically because they will hold in all of the pesticides which will then be inserted into your body. Fruits such as pineapple can be bought without being organic because the outside of the fruit is so thick that it will not hold any of the pesticides and will not endanger your health.
13. What Does "All Natural" Really Mean. Fave Diets Blog.2009. http://www.favedietsblog.com/what-does-all-natural-really-mean/
Writer Mindy, talks about how all natural does not really mean what it says. Many restaurants and companies are labeling their products "all natural" in hopes to sway consumers towards their products over others that do not have "all natural" written on them. "The FDA mandates that foods labeled “all natural” contain no artificial sweeteners or colors and no artificial flavors. The FDA defines natural flavors as anything derived “from a spice, fruit or fruit juice, vegetable or vegetable juice, edible yeast, herb, bark, bud, root, leaf.” However, all natural does not mean "organic". Although most companies are saying that their food is not "man made" it does not necessarily mean that there were no pesticides used while the product was growing. It is important to understand exactly what all natural consists of so consumers such as ourselves do not get sucked into the "all natural' phase if it is really not what we think it is.
14. FDA. The Food Label and You. Youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg6ru8XatGo
This award winning video produced by the FDA takes you into a food market and introduces you to the different labels and names that can be found throughout all markets all over the country. If you are not sure whether reduced fat or low fat is better, you should compare the two by looking on the back of their labels. If you want the healthier one, you should choose the product that is low in fact, rather than reduced fat. Looking on the nutrition facts on the back of the product can allow you to look at numerous things. One thing that you should look for is the serving size for each product. It tells you about how many servings that product holds. Although it may only say that there are 5grams of fat in a serving of cookies, it is important to realize that it is for only one serving. Sometimes the portion size may be 11, therefore the nutrition facts change if you were to eat more than three cookies.
15. Mayo Clinic. Organic Foods: Are they safer? More Nutritious?Mayo Clinic Website. http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/organic-food/NU00255
The staff from Mayo Clinic, a medical clinic that has advice online, introduces the differences between organic foods and those foods that are not considered organic. Their goal for you is to "Learn the difference between organic foods and their traditionally grown counterparts. Decide which is best for you, considering nutrition, quality, taste, cost and other factors." The word "organic" refers to the way in which a particular food item has been grown and picked. "Organic farming practices are designed to encourage soil and water conservation and reduce pollution. Farmers who grow organic produce and meat don't use conventional methods to fertilize, control weeds or prevent livestock disease." The website provides a diagram which shows the differences between organic produce and conventional produce. Some of the differences include: organic farmers give animals organic feed and allow them access to the outdoors. Use preventive measures — such as rotational grazing, a balanced diet and clean housing — to help minimize disease as opposed to conventional farmers who give animals antibiotics, growth hormones and medications to prevent disease and spur growth. It is also very important to look for the USDA symbol on any organic foods. This shows that the food item is a 100% organic as opposed to other food items that may be only partially organic. Although most people assume that organic means completely organic, they are wrong. In order for something to be 100% organic is different standards from a product just being considered "organic"
- 100 percent organic. To use this phrase, products must be either completely organic or made of all organic ingredients.
- Organic. Products must be at least 95 percent organic to use this term.
16. Certified Organic Label Guide. Organic.org. http://www.organic.org/articles/showarticle/article-201
This website is designed for consumers to read and understand the USDA significance of organic labels. The website wants to help consumers make sense of organic labeling, although it can be difficult, and teach many consumers who do not understand the significance of the USDA Organic label. Since October 21, 2002, guidelines have been created by the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Organic Program (NOP) to assure consumers know the exact organic content of the food they buy. Products which are labeled100% Organic are foods made with 100% organic ingredients and may display the USDA Organic seal.Products labeled Organic are "products that contain at least 95–99% organic ingredients (by weight). The remaining ingredients are not available organically but have been approved by the NOP. These products may display the USDA Organic seal".The website also tells you to keep in mind that even if a producer is certified organic, the use of the USDA Organic label is voluntary. At the same time, not everyone goes through the rigorous process of becoming certified, especially smaller farming operations.
17. Cevallos, Marissa. Dieters Find 'Healthy' Food Labels Can Be Tricky. Los Angeles Times. http://articles.latimes.com/2011/apr/21/news/la-heb-dieter-label-20110421
Consumers who are looking for 'healthy' food may be more easily fooled than those who are not dieting. "In one of several similar experiments, researchers from the University of South Carolina found that dieters were more likely to rate a pasta dish as healthful if it was labeled as a salad." By changing the names of different food dishes, restaurants and food chains are easily able to shape the view on the consumers mind and trick them into thinking that the food is healthier than it really is. A group of dieters and non dieters were asked if a specific food was considered 'healthy' or not. By changing the name of the meal from "pasta" to " salad", more than half of the people interviewed felt that the "salad" was considered healthy while the same meal with the name "pasta" was proven to be termed unhealthy. This just goes to show that restaurants and products can change the name of their products in order to get more consumers buying their products without actually making the product any healthier than it was.
18. Adams, Mike. "All natural" claim on food labels is often deceptive; foods harbor hidden MSG and other unnatural ingredients. Natural News. 2005. http://www.naturalnews.com/005778.html
"When you're shopping for groceries, watch out for the phrase "all natural" as claimed on the front of various product packages. It turns out that the phrase "all natural" can mean just about anything; it actually has no nutritional meaning whatsoever and isn't truly regulated by the FDA." This is something that many food researchers are coming across and although this is working its way out into the public, the companies are not changing the 'all natural' on their products. By definition, anything that is made from 'natural resources' can be considered natural and although a product may use natural ingredients, its the way that the product is produced is what is unnatural about the food. Although this may be the case, the producer of the product does not have to label how his product is made, therefore the product that you just purchased is 'all natural'.
