summaries

Deciphering a Meal:
In "deciphering a meal" Mary Douglas is readdressing the topic of Hebrew dietary laws by recognizing and relating what she already knows about the ancient Hebrews. She begins by looking at how New Guinea and Thailand apply their social laws to not just their community, but also to their food. The article describes how if an animal commits an act that is unacceptable for a human to commit then it is not fit to be served on the dinner table.
From there the articles examines the Hebrews and the social laws that they apply to their own animals. For Hebrews everything is about holiness. They do not do or eat anything that is considered unholy and would defile them. All animals have certain psychical traits the they must match in order to be deemed fit for the table or the alter.
The article goes on to examine the different ways in which the social customs of the Hebrews are applied to their animals. Any act that would deem a person unholy applies to the animals. one such example being birds that eat other birds and consume their blood are unholy and unfit for the table. The whole point of the restrictions are that inorder to enter the temple of god a person must be holy and by affiliating with food or performing acts deemed unholy then that person has defiled themselves and is no longer fit to enter the temple.

The Culinary Triangle
In "The culinary triangle" Claude Levi-Strauss applies the "'vowel and consonant triangles'" to food inorder to create a system of edible food that expans across cultural boundaries. The article startes out with the categories of raw, cooked, and rotted as the posts for the triangle. Since rawness has little variance accross cultures, the article looks in to how to classify dishes as cooked and raw.
The article goes into two sub-categories, roasted and boiled. Roasted is considered to side with nature while boiled goes along with culture. The reasoning behind it is that inorder to boil something a person must first craft some kind of container to hold both the meat and water. While for roastin all that is needed is a handy stick and a fire.
From there the article goes into other sub-categories such as smoked and fried. By doing this a second deminsion is added to the culinary triangle. This allows a more all incompassing view of the different ways in which dishes are pepared. Based on the preperation of a dish it is placed closer to either cooked or rotted.

Comparison
The two articles are very similar in that they break down their topics all the way to the basic units of its structure and work their way back up. Both articles started off with diagrams that conveyed basic messages. From their the slowly add pieces one or two at a time. By the time the article reaches the end the diagram constructed is simple and extensive enough for the reader to be able to apply it back to society. A reader is able to see how different social standards and restraints shape the way a group of people not only eat but prepare their food.