Packaging inner piece: a sociohistorical exploration of nerve food in Great Britain

This paper explores the phenomenon of “nerve food” - a concept created by food companies and advertisers in the late nineteenth century to sell products following greater studies into anxiety, as well as the growth of contemporary science on nutrition and psychosomatic medicine. Adopting a sociohistorical approach to the theoretical perspective of social semiotics, it presents and analyses eight examples of British nerve food advertising to track its chronological development over time. It finds that advertisers capitalized upon national concerns of the time, whether related to neurasthenia, shellshock, imperialism, neuralgia or the Blitz, to construct a particular discourse that persuaded consumers that nerve food would improve their mental health or the health of their loved ones.