Regionale Spezialitäten als globales Gut. Inwertsetzungen geografischer Herkunft und distinguierender Konsum

The present contribution comprises an analysis of the dynamics involved in the spatial differentiation of eating and drinking as determined by global conditions. Drawing primarily on the example of the protective system of the European Union (PDO, PGI), the analysis focuses on the labeling of regional specialties by means of Geographical Indications. To this end, the initial phase evaluates the key coordinates within which the range of instruments and practices are situated. This involves the terminological bases whereby the various processes of specialization are described, as well as the negotiation of tradition and juridification. Based on the above, the paragraph “Creating Traditions: Product and Construction” focuses on the scope and argumentative approaches to the conservation of origins, while also showing those processes of demarcation and differentiation which are already established therein. The following, complimentary paragraph “Eating Knowledge: Consumption and Appropriation” switches perspective, as it were, whereby the significance and social location from the consumer perspective is reconstructed. This then leads to the chapter “The Global Made Local? Co-productions and Self-sufficiency” which advocates an integrative future outlook. The focus here is based on findings invariably only relationally understood as the co-constitution of material goods and their respectively charged significance – a field characterized visibly by increasingly fluid boundaries between production and consumption.