Foodways, social sustainability and the multiscalar foodscape in Asia

Foodways and food practices are intrinsically linked to bodily nourishment, sustenance of the social body and sociality, and place images. The food we eat, the spaces we eat in, the ways in which we share food, and the food imageries we communicate to others are practices and interactions enacted in multiple socio-cultural spaces and on different temporal-spatial planes. Food practices have become ever more complex through globalization and the resultant social transformations. It is now common for people to experience the waxing and waning of foodways and the rapid reshuffling of food spaces. This Special Section examines the variegated interrelationships between food practices and social sustainability in multiscalar foodscapes. It contains seven case studies that illustrate the development of a multiscalar foodscape within local contexts and that highlight people’s food experiences in relation to communities’ social and economic survival, human – food and human – human connections, social cohesion and divisions, and intergenerational food tensions.