Making Fast Food

Dean Tudor is a journalism professor at the Ryerson Polytechnical
Institute and founding editor of the CBRA.

This book tries to examine the fast-food industry’s impact on the
family. It also details the growth and development of the fast-food
market, with its cheap labor force and quick food preparation (i.e.,
shortcuts). At 211 pages, growing out of a Ph.D. dissertation, this
itself is a “fast” book.

Most of the material here comes from field research conducted by the
author, who, in 1982-83, spent five months working full-time at Burger
King. Her emphasis is on laboring for a fast-food empire in a
service-sector job. Most of the other material here is mainly
background, such as the data on the restaurant industry in Canada, or on
fast food in general. Much of it seems to have come from the items in
her extensive 15-page bibliography. Yet even this needs to be critically
redefined. Most entries for periodicals, for instance, look like the
following examples: “Advertising Age. Selected issues, 1966-80” and
“Barron’s. Selected issues.” This is not enough. Most of the
references are for the pre–1985 period.

Essentially, this is a work cast through 1985, with some updating only
for confirmation since that time. Considering the nature of the
fast-food industry, surely more than a quick check of what has happened
in the past seven years deserves to be made.