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Current generations have been strongly influenced by mass communication and massive immigration flows, which may change local lifestyles and perceptions of inhabitants towards traditional foods and beverages (TFBs). TFBs constitute a core element of the cultural identity of a country, although some of them are losing their appeal. In this study, the authors explored the TFBs perceptions of inhabitants in nine countries to determine if their food identity is changing by analysing the TFBs most frequently mentioned by different age cohorts within a country. Six countries were found to have a distinctive core of TFBs shared across age cohorts (homogenous), whereas the remaining showed a heterogeneous pattern. Correspondence and cluster analyses usually grouped younger generations together implying higher similarities among these cohorts. Furthermore, the binary logistic regression analyses performed identified significant differences in the probability of mentioning a specific TFBs across age cohorts per country. Data collected show younger cohorts focusing on TFBs categorised as snacks and foods on-the-go, whereas older cohorts more often refer to time-consuming savoury preparations. The results suggest that lifestyles and current societal trends in food consumption, for example, convenience and healthiness, are impacting the food culture and identity of countries, and therefore play an important role in the variation of TFBs perception and consumption between age cohorts within countries. The results obtained in this study could not only be used by food policymakers and nutritionists to distinguish the current trends that are reshaping the food identity and eating behaviours of the population but also to improve or develop new dietary strategies by age cohorts in the countries studied.

A territorial food identity is characterised by a set of cultural markers that the majority of the inhabitants of a territory consider as indigenous to their culture and the foreigners identify as typical of this part of the world or frankly exotic. These markers are various: products, recipes, culinary techniques, consumption patterns, table manners, food preferences or representations. Logically, a territorial identity cannot be separate of a sense of belonging. The people who live in a certain area agree that their ways of eating present more similarities than differences and that they consequently share a common food culture that set them apart from the rest of humanity, especially from their closest neighbours. The identification of criteria for convergence/differentiation and the definition of their levels of relevance is necessarily an arbitrary choice as soon as we consider a territory where two or more human primary groups are settled. A village has its own food identity because its inhabitants decided to forget the “minor” differences that existed in the ways of eating between one family and another and to emphasise the existence of food emblems recognised by all the community members. The same process can be observed at all territorial levels. By consequence, the territorial food identity that can be found somewhere in the real world is generally complex because it is simultaneously local, regional, national, etc. To understand its dynamics, it is useful to imagine it as a large matrioska set. At the most local levels of identity, strong originality markers play a crucial role. At superior levels, federative elements are much more important. We will consider the case of Cuyoaco’s central district food identity. Cuyoaco is a town of about 2000 inhabitants in the municipality of Cuyoaco, in the state of Puebla, in Mexico, in North America.

Research surrounding cultural identity and food customs throughout history are published often, but any research that attempts to combine the two are often based in more recent history. Few combinations of the two are available, and fewer explore the implications within ancient colonization and expansion. The research for this thesis was conducted with three viewpoints in mind: the colonization of Britannia from Romans within the new colony, the colonization from the native Briton’s perspective, and the Roman citizens within Britannia at the end of Rome’s military involvement with the colony. This method was chosen because in the early years of Britannia acting as a colony, there was much divide between the people emigrating in and the local populations, and by the end of Rome’s official involvement, several hundred years later, the population was almost entirely homogenous and therefore was more easily seen in contrast with the Roman Empire. The nature of this research indicates that recent trends within historical study to understand the effects of colonization on modern civilizations can be used to effectively explore parts of the further past that otherwise would not be examined.