A former Black Panther, Eldridge Cleaver never got into the soul food restaurant franchise business like Ali, James, Brown, or Mahalia Jackson, but he plenty to say about food and class. “You hear a lot of jazz about Soul Food,” he wrote in 1968. “Take chitterlings: the ghetto blacks eat them from necessity while the black bourgeoisie” hold them in contempt. For affluent blacks, “eating chitterlings is like going slumming” says Cleaver. During a Q &A at a lecture and book signing I did yesterday, a person asked me, so what can you tell us about chitterlings? This is a question I often get at lectures I give on my book Hog and Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14638-8/hog-and-hominy/excerpt. I tell people that, after watching travel channels show Bizarre Food, I have learned that chitterlings are not distinctive to African Americans and soul food, they are distinctive and comfort food of poor folks all over the world. Poor folks cannot afford to throw away any source of protein. Folks with money have always eaten high on the hog and held poor cuts and portions of the hog like chitterlings in contempt. In contrast, those who’s financial circumstances forces them to eat low on the hog including chitterlings, trotters (pig’s feet), and pigs snots don’t have a lot of choices. Cleaver noted, “people in the ghetto want steaks. Beef Steaks,” but unfortunately they can only afford chitterlings which butchers often gave way or sold dirt cheap. In short, what we eat is most often an indicator of a social class and earning power.A former Black Panther, Eldridge Cleaver never got into the soul food restaurant franchise business like Ali, James, Brown, or Mahalia Jackson, but he plenty to say about food and class. “You hear a lot of jazz about Soul Food,” he wrote in 1968. “Take chitterlings: the ghetto blacks eat them from necessity while the black bourgeoisie” hold them in contempt. For affluent blacks, “eating chitterlings is like going slumming” says Cleaver. During a Q &A at a lecture and book signing I did yesterday, a person asked me, so what can you tell us about chitterlings? This is a question I often get at lectures I give on my book Hog and Hominy: Soul Food from Africa to America http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14638-8/hog-and-hominy/excerpt. I tell people that, after watching travel channels show Bizarre Food, I have learned that chitterlings are not distinctive to African Americans and soul food, they are distinctive and comfort food of poor folks all over the world. Poor folks cannot afford to throw away any source of protein. Folks with money have always eaten high on the hog and held poor cuts and portions of the hog like chitterlings in contempt. In contrast, those who’s financial circumstances forces them to eat low on the hog including chitterlings, trotters (pig’s feet), and pigs snots don’t have a lot of choices. Cleaver noted, “people in the ghetto want steaks. Beef Steaks,” but unfortunately they can only afford chitterlings which butchers often gave way or sold dirt cheap. In short, what we eat is most often an indicator of a social class and earning power.
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