Los adolescentes como consumidores: opciones y espacios de comida en Palermo, Italia

Abstract

The eating habits of young people within a city define forms of spatialities (spatiality?) and socialities (sociality?) that, in turn, imply systems of values and complex cultural processes. From a geographical and anthropological perspective studying how teenagers conceive food, its consumption and his specific related spaces can provide important interpretations about the cultural dynamics of an important dimension of contemporaneity. Not only because it is possible to explore how trends and consumption are linked, but above all it is possible to understand the relation between spaces and its uses. This paper aims to study these dynamics through the analysis of some texts produced by students aged between 17 and 19 who live in Palermo, the capital of Sicily. By tracing significant textual elements, we will highlight the manner in which young people, build physical and symbolic spatial forms by assigning them specific uses in relation to the consumption and sharing of food. In this way, we will be able to describe the urban geography drawn by teenagers which includes, more broadly, action programs, as well as agency and performativity capable of overcoming or circumscribing identity and social boundaries. Moreover, the study will take into account the way in which the current limitations imposed by the containment of the Covid-19 pandemic are changing eating habits and forms of mobility even in young people.