Subjectivity and Subalternity in the Food Movement: Two Ways to Rethink Social Movements.

Starting from the food movement questioned on the basis of his relation to the subaltern subjects, this communication seeks to think the concept of social movement and what it means to be an actor. By their prefigurative actions, the will to change the world in the everyday life rather than in mass mobilizations, these actors of “the way of subjectivity” transform the concept of social movement and social change. They believe in a personal change to change the world and thereby put the relation to themselves at the heart of their engagement. But it appears that the actors of the food movement are generally characterized by high social and cultural capital. Social conflict and antagonisms are not very present in their discourses, sometimes giving way to moralism to think about social change on a larger scale. How can we articulate this « activist culture » with the condition of the subaltern subjects, which are invisibilized, including as actors of social change? Several authors have tried to show how to refuse the idea of subalterns as passive actors of change, by turning away from the concept of social movement. They have shown that these subaltern subjects try to transform their daily living conditions by acts of resistance, subversive practices, participating in the transformation of norms and improving their life. The purpose of this communication is therefore to make a dialogue between these two ways of being an actor in the everyday life, away from institutions, in order to understand where the tensions are and how they can interact, starting from the terrain of local food.