São Paulo, gastronomia capital: socio-ethnography of a global consumer circuit

• Grant number: 16/24696-2
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Effective date (Start): April 01, 2017
• Effective date (End): August 31, 2021
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Sociology - Urban Sociology
• Principal researcher: Bianca Stella Pinheiro de Freire Medeiros
• Grantee: Mauricio Piatti Lages
• Home Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This research intends to discuss the relationship between the expansion of restaurants in the central areas of São Paulo (Pinheiros, Consolação, República and Santa Cecília districts), in the last two decades, and the internationalization of gastronomy as a set of aesthetic protocols that inform the act of eating, contributing to its entry into the category of leisure and urban entertainment. From a socio-ethnographic approach, we can address the way consumers, chefs and businessmen articulate these new references, consolidating new capitalization strategies through consumption. On the other hand, it is necessary to circumscribe the present moment within the larger role that the city occupies in the national and international economy, comparing the image of gastronomic capital with the other historical figures that São Paulo has taken along its development. Considering the importance acquired by the circulation of lifestyles at a global level, our intention is to approach the way in which this new landscape of consumption is constituted by the conjunction between the gastronomy and the habit of eating out.