The Appeal of Disgust

Picture from Charles Darwin's The Expression of the Emotions of Animal and Man (1872).

“Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liverslices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencodds roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine.” (52)

In this extract from James Joyce’s Ulysses (serialised 1918-1920) the main character Leopold Bloom’s meal seems to embody the essential elements to evoke the ultimate feeling of disgust. His highly abnormal diet could be seen as an extreme example of how tourists might consider the alternative food sources that are utilized in foreign countries, which I certainly experienced in my travels. Looking back through my previous blog-posts I see that they all explore the notion of estrangement and disgust through encountering foreign culinary cultures. Whether it is from my own personal experience or a through Mary Rowlandson’s narrative there seems to be a preconception that what is unknown is immediately marked as disgusting (on different levels of course). Yet, why is it that we succumb to our curiosity and defy our initial sensory impression of disgust? In Charles Darwin’s text The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals (1872) he describes humans’ notion and response to disgust:

“As the sensation of disgust primarily arises in connection with the act of eating or tasting it, it is natural that its expression should consist chiefly round the mouth. But as disgust also causes annoyance, it is generally accompanied by a frown, and often by gestures as if to push away or to guard oneself against the offensive object.” (256).

Interestingly though, despite all these warnings, we still feel inclined to try the item that repels us. Arguably, the eccentricity of a foreign culture’s culinary traditions brings our curiosity to a point where we study it with our eyes, we smell it with our noses, and taste it with our mouths, all in the hope that we might be able to understand it.

Although todays’ supermarkets are filled with foreign culinary products that we have adopted throughout the years, it has not always been this way. Perhaps the pizza did not evoke a feeling of disgust when it was first introduced to the market, it could be seen as a representation of our culinary curiosity that constantly challenge us to explore new foods. In a modern society where travel allows us to experience foreign cuisine first hand, the Tikka Masala Curry is not as exotic and thrilling anymore. Consequently, what we seem to be left with, is food that forces us out of our comfort zone and evokes a feeling of disgust.

Work Cited:

Darwin ,C. The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998

Joyce, J. Ulysses. London: Urban Romantics, 2013.