Understanding food-related health behaviour: An ethnographic study investigating the management of non-communicable diseases through the use of food by residents of Langa, Cape Town
| dc.contributor.author | Mjekula, Zonke Khanyi | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2025-08-18T09:19:08Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2025-08-18T09:19:08Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2023 | |
| dc.description.abstract | In this study, the main focus was on the management of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) through nutrition. I aimed to understand how people living with non-communicable diseases in the predominantly low-income township of Langa, Cape Town, make choices regarding their food consumption, and in relation to their health. I conducted an ethnographic study, in which I employed interviews, participant observation, and observations as my research methods. The findings show that people living in low socio-economic communities are predisposed to unhealthy nutrition, and health habits that often persist throughout their lives despite their emergent health conditions. The Langa people showed consumption cultures such as the consumption of street and fast food, the prioritisation of satiation over nutrition as well as ‘pay-day’ diets. The broader cultural context of Langa’s food consumption was found to be filtered down to the individuals and their health behaviours. Essentially, many had adopted unhealthy health- and nutrition behaviours due to their ties to identity and culture, and also because of the lack of social and economic capital to change their situations. Socio-economic status of the people was also found to be gravely hindering and restricting appropriate health-seeking behaviour among people living with NCDs. | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/10566/20736 | |
| dc.publisher | University of the Western Cape | |
| dc.subject | Non-communicable diseases | |
| dc.subject | Nutrition | |
| dc.subject | Socio-economic status | |
| dc.subject | Cultural values | |
| dc.subject | Food | |
| dc.title | Understanding food-related health behaviour: An ethnographic study investigating the management of non-communicable diseases through the use of food by residents of Langa, Cape Town | |
| dc.type | Thesis |