Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the demonizing of sugar in Danish upbringing and pedagogy and discusses how children navigate their sense of sweet taste in relation hereto.

Paper long abstract:

There is currently an enourmous focus on the danger of sugar in Danish health debates and policies. The uncertainty of what the sweet carbohydrates do to the body is especially expressed in relation to children.Parents quarrel about their children’s sugar consumption, every kindergarten has a so called sugar policy, school teachers discuss how a high sugar intake create noise in the classroom, the authorities produce posters displaying a sugar spy who can reveal how muchs ugar you eat, and recently a Danish songwriter published a children’s song about the sugar devil.

Based on the actual scientific uncertainty of the role ofsugar for health I trace how this dramatic scenery has developed in a Danish context and what it means for children’s experience of taste. Through a discussion of how children navigate and perform the paradoxes of sweetness I stress the moral dimensions of sugar and question the belief of sweet taste as natural.