PhD projekt: Madlavningslyst - en kvalitativ undersøgelse af hvad der motiverer unge til selv at lave mad, og hvordan deres madlavningspraksis indgår i deres hverdagsliv

Form of the thesis

The PhD-thesis is composed as a monograph.

The entirethesis spans 187 pages. In addition a DVD with examples of the video-footage from the empirical material is attached. The thesis is written in Danish and has an English and Danish summary. An appendix lists the relevant empirical material.

Summary of the thesis

The overall aim of the thesis is to investigate what motivates adolescents to cook and prepare food and how their cooking practice is situated in their everyday life. The problem statement of thethes is is thus: "Hvad motiverer unge til at lave mad, og hvordan indgar de resmadlavningspraksis i deres hverdagsliv?  [What motivates adolecents to cook, and how is their cooking practice situated in their everyday life " (p.47)]. This problem statement is followed by five research questions:

1. "Hvad spiser de unge i løbet af deres hverdag? [What do adolecents eat throughout their day?]

2. Hvordan tilbereder de deres mad? [How do they prepare their food?]

3. Hvilken betydning har forståelsen for hvad der kræves for at tilberede mad og afvikle et måltid for deres madlavningspraksis? [How does their sense of what it takes to prepare food and get through a meals affect their cooking practice?]

4. Hvordan indgår afviklingen af hverdagens øvrige måltider og aktiviteter i sammenhæng med deres aftensmadspraksis? [How do otherdoings and meal activities affect their dinner practice?]

5. Hvordan ville man kunne motivere unge, der ikke bryder sig om at lave mad til at gøre det? [How is it possible to motivate adolecents- whodo not like to cook- to cook?]

The thesis divided into ten chapters.

Chapter one briefly motivates the PhD-project and outlines the structure of the thesis.

In chapter two the author presents and discuss the research tradition that the thesis takes into account and builds upon- i.e. food sociology. Georg Simmel and Claude Fischler are the main sources of inspiration.

In chapter three the chosen theoretical approach ofthe thesis is briefly presented, namely practice theory as it has been developed by mainly Andreas Reckwitz, Theodore Schatzki and Alan Warde.

Chapter four prompts the research problem and the research questions referred to above.

In chapter five the author presents his chosen methodology, research design, methods of data production and strategy for the analysis. The chosen methods are qualitative- based on videorecorded observation studies and interview material.The chapter finally presents an exemplary data analysis to illustrate the chosen strategy for the analysis of the empirical material. The research was carried out amongst 16 residents of a Danish dormitory, sharing amongst themselves two kitchens. The data includes transcriptions of the 2,5 hours of interview with each of the participnats, 15 hours of web-com based video from the kitchens, as well as a minor number of recordings of meal preparations.

In chapter six the author presents and analyses the empirical material.

Based on this analysis the author- in chapter seven - sets out to typologize the cooking practices of the adolescents. Four typologies are identified: 1) The passion motivated cooking practice, 2) The necessity motivated food practice, 3)The negative ambivalent food practice, and 4)The positive ambivalent food practice.

Chapeter eight discuss the implication of the empirical findings in relation to the flow of everyday life, social motivation, meal preparation circuits, health, gender, identity and life structuration.

The analysis and study is summarized in the concluding chapter 9. This chapter also discuss and suggest propositions of how to motivate adolescents to cook.

Finally, in chapter ten, the author reflects on thetheoretical framework applied in the analysis (i.e.practice theory) in order to consider the advantages and shortcomings of the study. Perspectives for further theoretical and empirical research is finally suggested.