The contradictions of a superfood consumerism in a postfeminist, neoliberal world

This article examines the rise in the consumption of superfoods as a normative food trend among affluent groups in the global North that has embedded itself in Western food culture. It is argued that superfoods are a marker of idealized identity that is mobilized using neoliberal, postfeminist, and food justice discourses. The article examines the visual and textual framings of these products as they are implicitly and explicitly taken up on social media. In particular, it examines the material and ideological outcomes of tensions between the binaries of plenty and constraint, clean and dirty foods, and individual identity and conformity as they are expressed in the visual and textual discourse surrounding foods like goji berries, chia seeds, maca powder, and hemp. Also examined are the effects of a kind of body entrepreneurism that is encouraged by these discourses, which further pathologizes non-conforming bodies and produces, on the part of the consumer, corporal anxiety and a pained relationship with food.