This week I wanted to better understand the history of veganism. I only became aware of veganism in the recent years, so my goal going into this research was to know how long plant-based diets have been around or if they are a recent phenomenon. More specifically I really wanted to know when veganism became popular in the west.
So, where did veganism begin? The earliest record of people making the choice to not consume animal products can be traced back over 2000 years with ancient Indian and eastern Mediterranean societies living without meat. The first documented mention of a diet free of animals was made by Greek philosopher Pythagoras around 500 BCE, which personally I find mind boggling. The fact that people were making the choice to live a vegan diet long before it had a name and without the diverse options we have today is very impressive. In more recent history, the first known vegetarian society was formed in England in 1847 and the US was not far behind with the American Vegetarian society being formed three years later. This surprised me as with how my older relatives react to me being vegetarian, I always viewed vegan and vegetarian diets as a trend that had arisen in the 21st century.
Well now I know veganism had an early start, but my next question was when did veganism become popular in the west? The term veganism was coined in 1944 however it appears to not have grown into mainstream popularity until the early 2000’s. World vegan day was started in 1994 and by 2005 there were roughly 250,000 vegans in the UK with the US having nearly 2 million. Veganism clearly grew in popularity over the next decade as by 2016 Britain’s vegan population had tripled and the US general population increased from being 1% vegan up to 5%. I also found it very interesting that most of the people joining the plant-based lifestyle are 15 – 34 years old meaning I, being vegetarian, am on trend with people from my age group.
I now feel that I have a basic understanding of vegan history and I hope if you did not know much before that you learned a bit about this lifestyle. This information sets me up with a solid foundation as I go deeper into my research and start to find out more about the vegan lifestyle and the claims vegans make about their lifestyle.
Check out these resources where I got my information:
1. http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/ehost/detail/detail?vid=3&sid=940ed931-fbbf-4d60-8d95-ac6227b7046b%40sessionmgr102&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#db=aph&AN=127525090
2. http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/ehost/detail/detail?vid=2&sid=940ed931-fbbf-4d60-8d95-ac6227b7046b%40sessionmgr102&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#AN=135510064&db=aph
3. History by The Vegan Society
4. A Brief History of Veganism by Claire Suddath
