Why Is “Vegetarian” a Concept That Escapes Some People?

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Elima calling from Vancouver, Canada.

Hi, Elima. Welcome to the show. What’s up?

Hi. I had a question about being a vegetarian and the word meat.

So my daughter and I have been vegetarian for several years.

And this past Christmas, my sister was asking me about what that means.

So first she asked me if I was vegan and I said, no, we’re vegetarian.

And then she said, oh, so chicken is okay.

And I said, no, because chicken is not a vegetable.

And then she asked me, well, what about fish?

And I said, no, being a vegetarian means we don’t eat meat.

And she said, oh, well, to me, meat means red meat and not poultry or fish or other foods like that.

So, yeah, it just got me thinking.

To me, the word vegetarian is pretty straightforward and I’ve never had confusion about what it means.

But this actually wasn’t the first person who had questions about this or had that kind of confusion.

And so I was wondering if you could give me a little more information about that.

So what we’re talking about here, just to be clear, is really what vegetarian means and what the word meat, M-E-A-T, means to people.

Yeah. Well, Aleema, I think we maybe can be helpful from a linguistic point of view because a lot of people have this same experience that you do, of course.

But in linguistics, there’s a theory of categorization called prototype theory.

And this is the idea that any given concept in any given language has a real world example that best represents that concept.

So, for example, if I asked you to think of an example of a bird, to picture a bird, you know, you’re probably going to picture something like a robin or a sparrow.

And not an ostrich or a penguin, but those are birds too, right?

Right.

And so categories often have these central prototypes, and then they have fuzzier edges where, you know, we don’t think about those things so much.

And when we’re talking about meat, there’s the category of meat that definitely includes beef and pork, right?

Red meat is often the default for meat.

But then you have these fuzzier edges where people have different ideas about poultry and fish and shellfish because a lot of people don’t eat red meat, but then they’ll make exceptions for fish and shellfish and chicken.

And so that becomes, I think, confusing in everyday interactions.

And also you see similar categorizations by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

They divide animal flesh into meat and poultry.

And also, for some religious groups, you might be avoiding meat on Fridays or during Lent, but you can still have fish.

Or maybe your religion teaches that you’re not supposed to mix meat and dairy, but it’s still okay to have a bagel with cream cheese and lox.

So I think from a linguistic point of view, it’s interesting to think about these categories and how there are the central categories of red meat.

But animal flesh is more than red meat, isn’t it?

Yeah, I guess. Could I ask a follow up question?

Sure.

Yes. So in the terms of the language or the wording, I guess the thing that was confusing me was people obviously understand that chicken is animal flesh.

But is there a different word that is used in their mind to describe chicken meat?

Would that just be poultry or, you know, like that’s where it was stopping me.

Like, what word would I use to describe chicken meat or fish meat?

Yeah, beyond those two, I don’t know.

And I think you’ve also zeroed in on, you know, these places in our language where we don’t have words for people who make exceptions for chicken or fish.

Well, pescatarian.

Yeah, people talk about pescatarian, but I’ve also seen people talk about pescapolitarian.

Oh, goodness.

Chicken and fish. But we don’t have real clear categories like that. I mean, pescatarian for sure.

And then there are different flavors of vegan too. So it does take a lot of extra words a lot of times.

That’s kind of where I was coming from, where as a vegetarian, I’ve always wanted to be accommodating of people and not impose my views on them.

So I try to avoid excessively discussing what I eat and don’t eat.

And, you know, using these terms can try to clear things up, but sometimes it actually just leads to more confusion.

Exactly.

And Elima, I’m betting that we have lots of listeners with lots of opinions on this and maybe solutions for us.

So keep listening and I’m hoping we’re going to hear from them.

Thank you so much for your call. We really appreciate it. Thank you so much.

All right. Take care now. Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

So what happens when you ask for no meat or no carne in a restaurant?

What do you get?

Do you get chicken and fish offered?

Let us know, 877-929-973, or email words@waywordradio.org.