Monthly Archives: February 2015

This afternoon, a sweet and helpful professor passed on a link to the University of Toronto at Scarborough’s website, Culinaria. I had never before heard of this project, which is a multidisciplinary effort to engage with the culture and diversity of foodways by both graduate and undergraduate students. There’s even a journal I had never heard of—Global Food History. How Had I missed this? I quickly perused the listing of members of the editorial board and found some familiar names: Michael LaCombe, Peter Scholliers, and Paul Freedman. All three are cultural historians who have produced working concerning food in history, and I have explored and am continuing to explore their work. However, the Culinaria website makes it a conscious effort to explain that it is involved in a multidisciplinary project. Indeed, their website showcases projects that aren’t strictly historical, such as an exploration of the role of food as it relates to identity in diaspora communities. I pushed these new findings to the back of my mind as I attempted to get back to my assignments for this week, and duly started thinking about my blog assignment.

As I tried to think of current issues that are being addressed within the food history community, Culinaria kept nagging at the back of my mind. I couldn’t help but wonder—what, exactly, is the “food history community,” and who are its constituent members? Without realizing it, I’ve been attempting to address this confusion throughout my research. I have tried to map out a historiography of the field, but have failed. LaCombe offered some insight into this in his 2013 article “Subject or Signifier: Food and the History of Early North America,” though he too questioned the precise role that food plays in historic scholarship. Much as I have seen in my readings, he argues that food has been used as a tool in diverse scholarship over the past few decades, though it has not become a primary area of study until recently. He concludes that food can be a useful cultural indicator, which I certainly agree with. Despite this, though, I’m left with a bit of bewilderment—how will this be done, and by whom?

I suppose the greatest issue I see that resonates with my research, then, is defining the depth and breadth of food history and who takes part in that conversation. This directly relates to my research since I am reaching for a variety of sources from a multitude of fields. I appreciate and admire the interdisciplinarity of food studies and am excited to be a part of it, yet it is likewise challenging. In a field that is currently developing its own identity, how will I learn how to be its scholar? Who will teach me how to do this? I can only conclude that I must keep reading, keep learning, and start talking. Until I am able to interact with other scholars who have studied food, I won’t fully understand what I’m trying to get myself into. Don’t worry—I meant that a bit wryly, though I do sometimes wonder!

As far as research questions are concerned, this does prompt me to wonder about what methodology or theoretical approach is best for my work. At this point, I suppose I don’t know. However, I know what I’m going to do next. I am going to take the list of editorial reviewers for Global Food History, go to Summon, and do a massive search. I think reading their work will be very helpful in developing a sense of the field, a feeling of where things have been and where they may be going, and how they’re getting there. Hopefully my issue of trying to define a shifting and developing field will become a bit more graceful as time goes on, though its fluidity is one of the most attractive things about it.

A focus statement. Yikes. I suppose the most comforting part about a focus statement is that it will change as my project progresses. That, at least, is comforting! To begin hashing out what my focus statement should be, I took advice from Single and answered the series of questions she poses in Demystifying Dissertation Writing. Though I didn’t collaborate on asking these questions with a partner as she suggests, it was still a very useful exercise. It made me think critically about my project, my expectations and limitations, and what the point of the entire project was. I asked myself the following:

What is your project about? My project is about a 1795 cookbook, and how the included recipes can help us to better understand everyday life during the period in which it was composed.

Why am I conducting this research? I find it personally interesting, and believe that it is important to continue contributing to the growing field of food history.

Why should anyone care about this project? Food is a universal, and as such can be used as a powerful tool to help us understand the lives of those individuals involved with its production, consumption, and intangible collection. Everyone eats, everyone lives, let’s work to better understand how the two interact.

What is the big picture? It is important to pursue this topic for a few reasons. First, food history is a developing field in which new voices are both needed and sought. Second, this manuscript has never before been studied.

When I’m finished with this project, what is the point I wish to leave with my readers? Eek. I suppose I’m still figuring this out, but I’m hoping it’s something along the lines of—there’s so much more to a recipe or a dish than meets the eye.

What theories or methodologies will I use? I’m hoping to use material culture analysis and cultural studies to help me evaluate sources and reach conclusions.

What data, sources, texts, or objects are most appropriate for me to work with? How readily accessible are they? As mentioned above, my primary resource will be a 1795 cookbook to which I have decent access. I’ve transcribed most of it, and am able to travel to the archive where it is stored. I will also need to consult other primary sources, though I’m still developing what they will be. I’m thinking perhaps newspaper articles, merchant records, ship manifestos, and advertisements. Many of these will be available online through databases.

What will be the contribution or implications of my project? It will offer a historically-based, food-first evaluation that interacts with food history historiography, on a previously unstudied resource.

How does this topic align with my professional mission and career goals? Honestly, this project has been over a decade in the making. From the first time I lit a fire and started learning how to do open hearth cooking, I’ve been contemplating the meaning of food in history. I plan to return to working in museums and hopefully working in some way with food history, so producing an academic work will be an added benefit. I’m still considering whether or not to include a Public History project with this, though it would also prove to be a wonderful skill-builder!

And so, I developed the following focus statement: My project is a case study of how recipes/cookbooks can be used to provide important insights into the significance food played and plays in everyday life, how food choice and recipe collection can be indicative of greater societal trends and self-definition.

I look forward to refining and further defining this statement as I continue my research and conversations with my advisor, professors, and colleagues. Who knows…perhaps it will entirely change by the end of the month!

In an effort to continue expanding my knowledge of the cultural history of food, this week I read Cultural Foods: Traditions and Trends by Pamela Goyan Kittler and Kathryn P. Sucher, published in 2000. I was unsure of what to expect when picking this book off the library shelf, but it had appeared repeatedly on a number of searches I did and so I decided it was worth looking into. At first glance, it is easy to tell that this is not a traditional work of historical scholarship. This can frequently make a work easy to dismiss as being non-academic. However, Kittler is a Cultural Nutrition Consultant and Sucher is a Registered Dietician, and so I approached the work as an opportunity to more fully understand the interdisciplinary roots of food studies.

I’ve started taking a more strict approach to my readings, employing the “THOMAS” method of identifying the Topic, Historiography, Organization, Method, Argument, and Significance of a work. Additionally, I’ve put more effort into taking citable notes. I’ve found that a combination of these two strategies helps me to quickly evaluate a source and determine its relevance and utility. Plus, it’s just kind of fun to have a method and personal set of standards to adhere to.

And so, here are my thoughts and notes on Cultural Foods:

Topic: The background culture of food and the cultural significance/manifestation of food habits and choice, both traditionally and within modern situations.

Historiography: The work doesn’t interact with many historical works, though I think it is interesting and important to note that both William Woys Weaver and Karen Hess (early non-historians who are credited for influencing the beginnings of food history) are referenced in the notes. I believe it is also important to note that this work is not necessarily intended to interact with other works of food history, as it was written for an audience of food service professionals and those interested in cultural studies. This in and of itself, though, is a significant point to consider. See “Significance” below for more thoughts on this.

Organization: The work is organized thematically, giving an introduction followed by separate chapters exploring different ethnic, cultural, and religious groups present in America. Each section is also broken down further with a brief history followed by traditional foodways and modern interpretations of food culture.

Method: The authors evaluated primary and secondary sources to develop their theory of an “American” worldview. They relied heavily on scientific documents and publications, into which category I would place publications by the American Dietetic Association and American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, as well as food industry resources such as menus produced by the National Restaurant Association. There was also a reliance on works of sociology to offer a cultural underpinning. Their primary resources were cookbooks, both older and more contemporary. By looking at the ingredients, methods of cooking, and implied significance of recipes in culturally distinct cookbooks, the authors were able to craft their argument.

Argument: Through an analysis of demographic data, food service publications, and eating habits, it can be determined that “American” cuisine is far more complex than mainstream media and thought claims. Far from being a “meat and potatoes” culture, American food is a consciously diverse blend of old and adaptively new cultures.

Significance: For me, the main significance of this work is that it is an earlier (2000) example of food studies. It provides a clearly articulated historiographical point proving the interdisciplinary roots of food studies. While some food historians may have been included in this, the beginnings of the cultural evaluation of food certainly wasn’t the realm of historians.

With a bit of a shift in topical focus this last week, I duly changed course for my secondary resource review. To sum up discussions and class—why can’t food be considered material culture? I’ve since started exploring sources in this area. Over the last week, I’ve been spending time reading the articles in Cultural Studies Review, volume 19: “Food Cultures and Amateur Economies.” In this collection of articles, scholars explore the cultural aspects of food and food production through a variety of studies, and help to establish that the scholarly foundations of food studies are still being built. It was particularly interesting to see this collection of articles as a whole, and to consider that they were published in 2013. It offered a very tidy state-of-the-field type reading for which I was grateful; I certainly need to know what is happening in the realm of food studies.

“The material culture of food, and its associated practices and taste formations, have long played a key role in the creation and maintenance of social identities based on ethnicity, nation, gender and class,” begin Isabelle de Solier and Jean Duruz.[1] While their introduction focuses mainly on the development of these concepts during more modern times than I am studying, theirs and subsequent articles provide examples of how food-based cultural history can be accomplished. They acknowledge that cultural historians lacked involvement in food studies until fairly recently, yet point to a foundational text: Food and Cultural Studies, by Bob Ashley, Joanne Hollows, Steve Jones, and Ben Taylor. I was previously unfamiliar with this 2004 work, but it is on my list of sources to check this upcoming week. Bonus points to this volume for pointing me in the right direction!

Taking a look at family culture and identity, food preparation’s significance, and how this relates to cookbooks, Sian Supski offers a gendered case study in “Aunt Sylvie’s Sponge: Foodmaking, Cookbooks, and Nostalgia.” Using her female forebears’ recipe for sponge cake, Supski weaves an intimate tale blending her own experiences with an analysis of vernacular cooking and recipe sharing. In her work, Supski explores the concepts of nostalgia (positive, productive, and ambivalent), space and place as meaning-making; she additionally applies Lisa Heldke’s concepts of “thoughtful practice” and “anxious practice” to her own experiences with baking and recipe sharing. She argues that one recipe can tell the stories of an individual and family, and that food making can be a conscious act of nostalgia. Though taking place in 20^th century Australia, this article is a rich source for me because it tidily organizes many of the thoughts I’ve had in one academic space—the concepts discussed above are assumptions that I had been working off of previously. Now, though, I have a road map to where and how I can find support for these thoughts. Again, of great utility from this piece comes her nods to scholars who have already traversed these grounds, including Janet Theophano (whose work I have already explored), as well as Lisa Heldke, Jon Holtzman, Jean Duruz, and Susan Lenoardi. While the latter authors are new to me, I am looking forward to seeing what offerings they have as I move forward. Another useful bit of this article is its style and construction. I was impressed with its construction and tone; while being scholarly, it was also personal and an engaging read. Going into a burgeoning, interdisciplinary field which has a large population of food writers in its ranks, I believe it is important to know how accepted published works are being written.

I had many similar reactions when reading Tamara Kohn’s article, “Stuffed Turkey and Pumpkin Pie: In, Through, and Out of American Contexts.” In this work, Kohn argues that identity can be directly related to food and food habits—including how and why one eats, and how and why one prepares food in a certain way. In short, food habits represent personal expression and therefore embody deep meaning. She does this through studying the concept of the Thanksgiving feast through time, determining that it has been and remains an inherently cultural manifestation and message.[2] Looking at food studies from a background in anthropology, she states that, “How these processes [migration, globalization, change, hybridity] are played out in the context of foodways is, I would suggest, particularly interesting, because one can explore how they manifested alongside often complex indications of locality and belonging.”[3] Exploring how the organized feast of Thanksgiving can do this, she asks how individual dishes can manifest these ideals. She concludes that recipes are commodities that convey meaning as much as they carry taste, and that both are important in the development of cultural meaning. “Food is a field of action,” she says, one in which many stories can be told.[4] Again, Kohn nodded toward scholars whose work I need to consult, while also solidifying for me assumptions that I had held. I was once more struck by her blend of personal and academic in her writing, bringing in her own experiences with her mother’s celery root salad as a way to illustrate and enliven her argument. For me, both of these works exemplify what I would like to do with my project, and both have given me a [hopefully] clearer path forward.

[1] Isabele de Solier and Jean Duruz, “Food Culture Introduction,” Cultural Studies Review 19, no. 1 (2013): 4.

[2] Tamara Kohn, “Stuffed Turkey and Pumpkin Pie: In, Through, and Out of American Contexts,” Cultural Studies Review 19, no. 1 (2013): 1-3.

[3] Ibid., 2.

[4] Ibid., 8.

As I continue to determine the course for my research, I find myself wading through secondary sources that may or may not be relevant in the long run. And, yet, they remain so very interesting. I can’t help but feel that, no matter what, they will help provide me with a useful background that will allow me to truly understand the context of my primary research. This week, I spent time exploring an author with whom I’m already familiar—Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. In fact, Ulrich provided my first exposure to microhistory when I was an undergraduate. Re-reading A Midwife’s Tale last semester in grad school made me remember why I loved it so much—using something so seemingly mundane to demonstrate the importance of an individual’s life in a greater setting inspired me to believe in the utility of close studies of nontraditional sources. Bearing this in mind, I set up reading The Age of Homespun: Objects and Stories in the Creation of an American Myth.

Though I am still coming to terms with the fact that my project may not be firmly based in American history, I firmly believe that Ulrich’s analysis of primary sources transcends much time and space. While the context in which her analysis rests, Ulrich’s methodology provides a strong example of how to engage with unique sources. Her use of material culture analysis in reading women’s lives through their possessions was particularly interesting. First and foremost, I admire Ulrich’s desire to readjust scholars’ perspective when approaching material goods. Instead of assembling them into a linear narrative as had been done in the past, she aims instead to evaluate how much objects, experiences, and lives intersect. The commonality shared between the object and experiences is vital to Ulrich, and makes me wonder to what extent cookbooks can demonstrate the same things…

Her third chapter, in which she looks at a cupboard owned by Hannah Barnard, is particularly interesting to me. Through a knowledge of cupboards/chests of drawers, Ulrich is able to analyze that of Hannah Barnard to come to conclusions about the life led around the cupboard. How could cookbooks be used to do the same thing? How much more evocative could cookbooks be? Can the very nature of recipes and ingredient-sourcing be used to create an equally intricate communal experience?

Last week’s readings and a thoughtful class discussion certainly impressed upon me the importance of selecting a manageable research topic for my thesis. Looking back on Turabian and her XYZ exercise, I produced the following:

 I am writing about a 1795 British cookbook written by a currently anonymous author

 Because I want to find out who she was, what community she operated within, and how food was a part of this and can help identify this

 So I can help others understand that food is more than just basic energy, that it has intrinsic meaning and value attributed to it by society. That the implications of food consumption are far-reaching. That what seems a simple choice can actually say much about daily life in the past and the greater historical narrative.

 With this in mind, I began to brainstorm about how I could turn those claims and desires into a manageable project with a meaningful set of questions. After thinking about what I would like to mine from my main primary source, I concluded that I would like to ask two main questions:

What can a cookbook say about its author, her life, and community?

How can the material culture of a manuscript help determine this?

What can this one specific book tell us about a specific individual, time, and place?

How can the ingredients and dishes present in this book enlighten us about the above topics?

 While the first two questions have been answered by other historians studying other works, I feel that the primary I am working with is unique in its value. Not only is it an unstudied manuscript, I also believe that it is important to contribute content to the field of food history, since it is a somewhat young area of focus. I strongly feel that it is important to make contributions that begin to bridge the field between cultural history and food studies, creating a food-first account of history. This in itself is a worthy undertaking, completely aside the contributions to the history of a specific time and place.