The flourishing fast food industry represents one particular blueprint of how to live. Reiter analyses the profound consequences of this blueprint for many spheres of life: women's work, youth employment, the labour movement, the family, and the community. Since the 1970s young people and women have increasingly entered the job market in low waged, service-sector jobs. Family life, she explains, has changed dramatically in the last forty years as many activities that were traditionally part of the home have been replaced by services available in the marketplace. The Production of meals and those who produce them have moved from the family kitchen to the highly regulated corporate workplace where workers are like the interchangeable parts of a machine.

Ester Reiter is a Senior Scholar in the School of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies, York University. The research for this book was adapted by director Ruth Howard of Jumblies Theatre for a play called Oy di Velt (Oh the World) first performed at Camp Naivelt and then remounted at Mayworks in 2009. Reiter is the author of Making Fast Food: From the Frying Pan to the Fryer.

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"A fascinating and highly readable study of the fast-food phenomenon that has become a symbol of life in contemporary society." Diane Schoemperlen, Books in Canada. "Making Fast Food is a long overdue book designed to uncover the brutal truths about the have-a-nice-day industry of burgers and French fries ... Reiter masterfully documents, analyses and attacks the low pay and appalling working conditions of the fast food labour force." Emily Caston, City Limits, London, England. "Illuminating ... This is a thought-provoking, honest, and painstaking work." Mark Abley, Montreal Gazette. "Unique ... innovative ... enticing ... An extremely important book ... Both the topic and the accessible Language make it a winner. So many people have worked or eaten in fast food restaurants. I think this book will interest them." Meg Luxton, Department of Social Science, Atkinson College, York University. "Creative, demanding, and instructive ... It is so rare that scholars undertake this kind of field research ... [Reiter's study] will come to stand as a classic text on qualitative methodologies." Roberta Hamilton, Department of Sociology, Queen's University.