Americans have a history with white breada long and complicated history.

99%
Invisible delves into this history in their podcast episode entitled Good Bread. They
explore the perception of white bread in America focusing on the late 1800s and early
1900s. The podcast concludes with the theory that the cultural perception of white
bread is less of a reflection on the bread itself and more of a refection on the identity of
the people buying it. And while most Americans wouldnt admit it, the American
perception of white bread has historically been framed by a desire for purity and
clouded by faulty perceptions.

The frames through which one views the world develop over time, based on
experience, interaction with others, and innate personality (Albers, Nakayama and
Marin 89). The frame through which most Americans viewed white bread in the late
1800s was largely based on the spread of food born illnesses like typhoid and cholera.
Since white bread came from factories, it was considered uncontaminated by human
hands and therefore safer to eat than bakery bread (Mars). However, this was not the
only frame through which Americans viewed white bread. At this same time in history
wealthy white Americans were concerned with the immigration of non-whites into their
society. It is now thought that since these ethnic immigrants were generally the people
working in bakeries, the cultural shift toward white bread had less to do with health
concerns and more to do with a white social prejudice. While food born illness was a
real threat to America at that time, it turned out that the bread was not a likely carrier for
these particular bacterium. Never the less, white bread became a cultural norm for white
Americans and began to represent the purity of the white race (Mars). The interactions

and cultural norms of white Americans at this time had them viewing white bread
through a frame of purity, both in their food and in their race.

Just like the earlier misrepresentation of the purity of white bread and the contamination
of bakery bread, all perceptions can be faulty. Americans in the late 1800s were unlikely
to be aware of their faulty perception of bakery bread. The choice to purchase white
bread was born out of social comparison. Humans place themselves and others into
categories in order to better understand the world. If a person puts themselves in the
same category as others around them, they begin to create social comparisons with
these people (Albers, Nakayama and Marin 97). It is not surprising that when some
white Americans began calling white bread the pure bread and bakery bread the
contaminated bread others went right along with this assumption. Because there are
many factors involved in creating perceptions, like social comparisons, perceptions are
often faulty.

Studying the historical perception of white bread in America shows how frames, cultural
norms, and social comparison, can affect ones understanding of the world. In the
podcast, 99% Invisible discussed the perception of white bread as it moved from a
staple in affluent white households to a metaphorical cheap white trash food in the late
1900s. Perceptions change over time because the factors that affect perception are
also continually changing. While perceptions help humans understand the world around
them, faulty perceptions can create prejudices and have negative consequences on
individual and society.

Sources:

Alberts, Jess K., Thomas K. Nakayama and Judith N. Martin. Human Communication In
Society. Ed. Karon Bowers. 3rd. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, Inc, 2012.

Mars, Roman. "Good Bread." 99% Invisible. Vol. 137. Podcast. Prod. Sam Greenspan.
San Francisco, 22 October 2014.