Communal meal

{{Short description|Meal eaten by a group of people}}

File:"Freedom From Want" - NARA - 513539.jpg by Norman Rockwell, an iconic image of an American Thanksgiving meal]]

File:Outstanding_in_the_Field_full_table_view.jpg]]

A communal meal is a meal eaten by a group of people. Also referred to as communal dining, the practice is centered on food and sharing time with the people who come together in order to share the meal and conversation. Communal dining can take place in public establishments like restaurants, college cafeterias, or in private establishments (home).{{cite web |last=Forgrieve |first=Janet |date=2011-01-19 |title=Communal dining - cozy setting or terrible trend? |url=http://smartblogs.com/food-and-beverage/2011/01/19/communal-dining-cozy-setting-or-terrible-trend/ |access-date=2012-04-02 |website=SmartBrief}}{{cite web |last=Stakal |first=Kimberley |date=2011-02-14 |title=Restaurants Go Communal: Are You In? |url=http://www.organicauthority.com/restaurant-buzz/community-dining-restaurant-trend.html |access-date=2012-04-02 |website=Organic Authority}} It often but not always serves a social, symbolic and/or ceremonial purpose. For some, the act of eating communally defines humans as compared to other species.{{Cite book |last=Fresco |first=Louise |title=Hamburgers In Paradise: The Stories Behind the Food We Eat |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2015 |isbn=9780691163871 |edition=1st |pages=560 |language=English}} Communal meals have long been of interest to both archeologists{{Cite book |last=Hayden |first=Brian |url=https://worldcat.org/oclc/1313871862 |title=The power of feasts : from prehistory to the present |date=29 September 2014 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-107-04299-5 |oclc=1313871862}}{{Cite book |editor-last=Bray |editor-first=Tamara L. |url=https://worldcat.org/oclc/1086492959 |title=The Archaeology and Politics of Food and Feasting in Early States and Empires |date=28 May 2007 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-0-306-48246-5 |oclc=1086492959}} and anthropologists.{{Cite book |first=Harriet |last=Whitehead |url=https://worldcat.org/oclc/1123902594 |title=Food rules : hunting, sharing, and tabooing game in Papua New Guinea |date=2000 |publisher=University of Michigan Press |isbn=0-472-09705-9 |oclc=1123902594}}{{Cite journal |last=Simon |first=Scott |date=2015-11-19 |title=Real People, Real Dogs, and Pigs for the Ancestors: The Moral Universe of "Domestication" in Indigenous Taiwan |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/aman.12350 |journal=American Anthropologist |volume=117 |issue=4 |pages=693–709 |doi=10.1111/aman.12350 |issn=0002-7294|url-access=subscription }}{{Cite book |first=Andrew |last=Strathern |url=https://worldcat.org/oclc/958554322 |title=Rope of Moka. |date=1971 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-511-55816-0 |oclc=958554322}}{{Cite journal |last=Gopi |first=Anil |date=December 2021 |title=Feasting Ritually: An Ethnography on the Implications of Feasts in Religious Rituals |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0972558X211057159 |journal=The Oriental Anthropologist: A Bi-annual International Journal of the Science of Man |language=en |volume=21 |issue=2 |pages=359–374 |doi=10.1177/0972558X211057159 |s2cid=244644874 |issn=0972-558X|url-access=subscription }} Much scholarly work about communal eating has focused on special occasions but everyday practices of eating together with friends, family or colleagues is also a form of communal eating.{{Cite journal |last=Dunbar |first=R. I. M. |date=September 2017 |title=Breaking Bread: the Functions of Social Eating |journal=Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology |language=en |volume=3 |issue=3 |pages=198–211 |doi=10.1007/s40750-017-0061-4 |pmid=32025474 |pmc=6979515 |s2cid=151610874 |issn=2198-7335}}{{Citation |title=Family meals — a thing of the past? |date=2013-04-15 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780203443798-7 |work=Food, Health and Identity |pages=44–61 |publisher=Routledge |doi=10.4324/9780203443798-7 |isbn=978-0-203-44379-8 |access-date=2022-10-31|url-access=subscription }}

Communal eating is closely bound up with commensality (the sociological concept of eating with other people).{{Cite journal |last=Fischler |first=Claude |date=2011 |title=Commensality, Society and Culture |url=https://doi.org/10.1177/0539018411413963 |journal=Social Science Information |volume=50 |issue=3–4 |pages=528–548|doi=10.1177/0539018411413963 |s2cid=56427179 }} Communal eating is also bound up with eating and drinking together to cement relations, to establish boundaries and hierarchies as well as for pleasure.{{Cite book |editor-last=Kerner |editor-first=Susanne |editor2-last=Chou |editor2-first=Cynthia|editor3-last=Warmind |editor3-first=Morten |url=https://worldcat.org/oclc/1201426965 |title=Commensality : from everyday food to feast |year=2015 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing Plc |isbn=978-1-4742-4532-6 |oclc=1201426965}}

Some examples of communal meals are the Native American potlatch, the Thanksgiving meal, cocktail parties, and company picnics. Meals shared for religious traditions include the Christian Agape feast, Muslim iftar, and Jewish Passover Seder.

Some restaurants feature communal meals at large tables where diners are seated next to strangers and are encouraged to interact with neighbors.{{Cite web |last=Walsh |first=Danielle |date=2013-03-20 |title=The Communal Table |url=https://www.bonappetit.com/entertaining-style/article/the-communal-table |access-date=2024-05-15 |website=Bon Appétit |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=Braun |first=Adee |date=2014-03-31 |title=Alone Together: The Return of Communal Restaurant Tables |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/03/alone-together-the-return-of-communal-restaurant-tables/284481/ |access-date=2024-05-15 |website=The Atlantic |language=en}}

Communal dining was an important part of ancient Rome's religious traditions.{{Cite book |last=Martens |first=Marleen |title=A Companion to the Archaeology of Religion in the Ancient World |year=2015 |isbn=9781118886809 |editor-last1=Raja |editor-first1=Rubina |language=en |chapter=Communal Dining |doi=10.1002/9781118886809 |editor-last2=Rüpke |editor-first2=Jörg}} There is a mention of communal dining in Chinese history.{{cite journal |last1=Chang |first1=Gene Hsin |last2=Wen |first2=Guanzhong James |date=October 1997 |title=Communal Dining and the Chinese Famine of 1958–1961 |journal=Economic Development and Cultural Change |volume=46 |issue=1 |pages=1–34 |doi=10.1086/452319}}