This research presents a sociological study of the lived experiences of foodstagramming, namely photographing food and sharing them on social media, for which I especially focus on Instagram. In 2016, Waitrose and many popular media reported a rise in foodstagramming in the UK. Despite the wide engagement foodstagramming has attracted, the topic received little attention from social researchers. Over the past four years, when social researchers did pay attention to the topic, it was predominantly to reduce foodstagramming into solely an instrumental practice for enacting existing social structures. Such analyses also reduced foodstagrammers into mere passive and selfish individuals who create and share food photos only because they can secure more privileged social positions. While acknowledging the importance of such arguments, they fail to capture the aesthetic elements that are involved in foodstagrammers’ lived experiences. This thesis fills this gap.
I adopted an inductive, pragmatic and interpretive approach in order to generate a nuanced and in-depth interpretation which captures the complexity and multidimensionality of foodstagramming. I recruited twenty-seven foodstagrammers living in the UK who produce and share foodstagrams with different purposes and styles. To generate insights into their lived experiences, I interviewed these participants and conducted online participant observations to understand 1. why they participate in foodstagramming, 2. how they create their foodstagrams and 3. why they create their foodstagrams in the ways that they do.
The findings suggest that far from being merely instrumental, foodstagramming is also an empowering, aesthetic and generative practice. It affords foodstagrammers the occasions and means to use the widely available everyday materials: food, photography and Instagram to express their aesthetic feelings and values that are related to these feelings. By doing this, foodstagrammers managed to use foodstagramming to exercise their agency and conduct their humble versions of world-making.
