Wartime nationalism drives renaming ordinary foods to purge enemy associations

Evidence

In a historical example of culinary verbal realism, the First World War inspired many in the US to rename sauerkraut as “victory cabbage,” hamburgers as “victory steaks,” and frankfurters as “hot dogs.” More recently, the refusal on the part of France to support the US war on Iraq led Representative Bob Ney (a Republican from Ohio) to propose that US government restaurants rename french fries as “freedom fries” and french toast as “freedom toast.” Despite these salient examples, there have been no empirical investigations of the prevalence, the antecedents, or the consequences of this tendency for verbal realism. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1274 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

This evidence of the impact of ethnophaulisms on the people towards whom they are directed also provides indirect support for Allport’s notion of verbal realism, the tendency to respond as strongly to words as to the actions they represent. In a historical example of culinary verbal realism, the First World War inspired many in the US to rename sauerkraut as “victory cabbage,” hamburgers as “victory steaks,” and frankfurters as “hot dogs.” More recently, the refusal on the part of France to support the US war on Iraq led Representative Bob Ney (a Republican from Ohio) to propose that US government restaurants rename french fries as “freedom fries” and french toast as “freedom toast.” Despite these salient examples, there have been no empirical investigations of the prevalence, the antecedents, or the consequences of this tendency for verbal realism. — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 1274 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Political conflicts trigger renaming of everyday foods to signal ethnic hostility. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1274; Renaming enemy-associated foods like sauerkraut and french fries counts as verbal realism — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years…, 1274; Nationalist polemic can recast a food staple as foreign cultural contamination. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 2524

Broader Connections

• Political conflicts trigger renaming of everyday foods to signal ethnic hostility. #corroborates (0.95) — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 1274
• Renaming enemy-associated foods like sauerkraut and french fries counts as verbal realism #exemplifies (0.92) — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 1274