Mapping Meat Technologies: Biosocialities and Geosocialities of Cellular Meat

The history of cultured meat is interesting and its aims are laudable, but the business model of disruptive innovation it is based on deserves careful consideration, as it sets the stage for major social and technological transformations. This is because behind the language of disruption lies a series of creative, technical, and financial assemblages couched in futurist ideals and profound anxiety about the present (Lepore, 2014). A critical perspective on the rhetoric and significance of cultured meat, at this historical juncture, reveals as much about Western society’s enduring beliefs and faith about progress and the potential of technology to save the world as it does about the unlearned lessons from the past, in other words about how we got here in the first place.