Authors

Discussion

The late Russian empire witnessed the emergence of new sciences of nutrition and veterinary, industrialization of meat slaughter, as well as changing understanding of food. Malnutrition was common. Plant protein made the lion’s share of people’s diet, yet anxieties about meat, its quality and shortage had been accelerating, so did livestock commodification. From the late 19th century, these anxieties turned into a “meat question.” The period also reflected the growing awareness of close interdependence of human and animal health, as well as vibrant life-reform movements. So, what place had meat eating occupied in the enduring discussions and growing concerns about people’s health, life reform and agricultural development in modernizing empire? My paper examines the multiplicity of discourses about benefits or dangers of dietary meat, in their evolvement and broader implications in the context of the late Russian empire. The advocates and critics (vegetarians, alimentary hygienists and life reformers, public health experts and social planners, agriculturalists, and meat producers, etc.) of meat eating encompassed a broad and shifting range of groups and individuals with allies in governmental circles, media, and sciences. As a result of the diversity of approaches and understandings, as well as actors and parties, vegetarian diet, mixed diet, high animal protein diet had been publicly promoted and practiced.