[10 July 2009] Freidberg sets out two premises that played a
large role in directing her inquiry into the changing meaning of
freshness. First, there’s no one-size-fits-all definition of
freshness. Second, people from different backgrounds, cultures,
and geographic regions value freshness in ways that are hard to
predict or understand. Increasingly, marketing plays a
distressing role in this shifting value system, changing that
definition of freshness and undermining longstanding habits of
preservation and seasonal snacking. Freidberg starts her
exploration of the meaning of freshness with simple blocks of
ice. Hewn from frozen lakes, chopped into chunks, and delivered
to the doorsteps of well-to-do housewives, ice provided the
means of getting food to last just a little bit longer. Ice
became big business until various methods of chilling air using
gas or electricity were developed. Enter the refrigerator.
Ladies’ Home Journal, eager to promote the ice box replacement,
gushed that refrigerators “‘are so comp