A note of gratitude

to communities that revive my way of thinking

Conferences are just like summer camp if you find the best people to bunk with. Photo and bracelets courtesy of KC Hysmith.

Short (and belated) post this week, because I’m catching up from an annual conference of food scholars and reflecting on the valuable respite and perspective it’s given me, especially on the subject of what fuels good scholarly output. As I’ve said in past posts, graduate school (and writing in general) is very isolating, and the work involved tends to produce (at least in me) a lot of self-flagellation and insecurity about my place in the world. More often than not, I find myself asking, “What’s the point of all this?”, which sends me either into the fiftieth revision of a chapter or into a fresh round of mindless social media scrolling. The potential of the snarky critic who undercuts each element of my argument causes me to freeze in place, and what I often forget is that there is both a snarky critic and an enthusiastic reader for everything.

At conferences—and most specifically, at conferences of food scholars—not only do I get to meet those readers in person (and see them laughing and nodding in agreement as I present), but I also get to see that those readers are struggling with the same challenges and isolation as I am, and aren’t afraid to puzzle out their ideas in community rather than outside of it. It’s such a joy to walk into a room where everyone is absolutely on board with the argument that when we talk about boneless chicken wings, we’re really talking about gender, or the need for a broader understanding of the systems of settler colonialism when discussing the exported notion of Hawaiian cuisine. But also all of us, because we are food scholars, have faced the same initial confusion and/or light recognition from others not in our field, that moment when other people hear you study food and they say, “Oh, how fun!” and end the conversation there. It takes a huge amount of faith in one’s work and faith in one’s community of fellow scholars to bring in-progress work into conference spaces, because one is always afraid that what one presents will be regarded as underbaked, superficial, or—perhaps worst of all—all mirth and no matter.

And yet, watching scholars who have navigated these dismissals or accusations over many years know exactly how to position themselves as intentionally transgressing between what is familiar (and, yes, fun) for many readers, and what can deepen our understanding of food as a rich scholarly topic. On one of the panels I attended, during the Q&A portion an audience member invited one of the presenting authors to include a discussion of neoliberalism in their work. The author responded—appreciatively, but resolutely—that they were trying to create a work for the general public, and so such terms wouldn’t be well suited for what they were tried to accomplish, and instead needed to be embedded in the evidence from the case studies under discussion. I loved this delineation—an acknowledgment that not everyone wanted to or needed to hear the same things in a work, and the equal footing that both scholarly audiences and popular audiences deserved to have in the formulation of their forthcoming book. That’s the same kind of pedagogical filtering that we do in the classroom—creating spaces where everyone feels comfortable offering their ideas, but also recognizing that not every idea is appropriate for every text or audience. Though it is a relatively young field, food studies has an irrepressible vitality lacking from so many other disciplines because it has so many different kinds of interested readers. Anyone can learn about food studies because anyone—and everyone—cares, on some level, about food and its meaning in our shared social and cultural lives.

But coming to that realization requires a community to welcome you in—and while I’m still working on finding it in academia, I know I’ve found it among food scholars. In particularly I’m grateful for the wise, witty graduate students and junior scholars who welcomed me to my first food studies conference years ago, who tweet with me, grab coffee and snack breaks with me, and most importantly show up when I need to see a friendly face in the audience. We used to joke that we were a nerdy equivalent of the Pink Ladies, denoted by our tendency to wear colorful cardigans in overly air-conditioned symposiums, but what started as an inadvertent fashion trend turned into a genuine bond. When you find your people, and you can spot each other from across a keynote address or crowded reception hall, it’s a balm and a reminder that regardless of your specific topic, discipline, or institution, you have earned the right to be there, and you are among friends.

As Julia Child said, “People who love to eat are always the best people.” I heartily agree.

Recommendation: I’ve been remiss in taking so long to get to it, but I snagged a copy of Kiese Laymon’s memoir Heavy at one of the conference’s book tables and cannot wait to finish it. As Laymon says on the first page, writing a memoir felt like writing a lie, especially one that frames the black relationship to food, hunger, and body as something pre-packaged, peppered “with acerbic warnings to us black folk in the Deep South and saccharine sentimental exhortations from Grandmama.” It’s made me think not only about the constraints placed on black narratives of food, family, and resistance, but also the unnecessarily restrictive bounds we place on narratives of food and personal experience. We want to believe that a good food memoir ends with a story of triumph, of sensory engagement and weight loss and long-last love and achievement. But pursuing those stories neglects the inherent exploitation that makes those endings possible, and the fact that no stories of past struggle are ever really past. I can’t wait to finally give this acclaimed book the attention it deserves, and a long deep think.

The Perfect Bite: In anticipation of hosting a bunch of food scholars for dinner on Friday night, I gathered a spread of my favorite dips, meze, and small bites from one of the spectacular groceries and prepared food stores in Watertown, Sevan Bakery. While pretty much everything they make is delicious, my favorite is their muhammara, a roughly chopped spread of red peppers, walnuts, bread crumbs, and just a light drizzle of pomegranate molasses. It’s a good thing we ate most of it, otherwise I’d slather my toast with it this morning.

Cooked & Consumed: Our grilled skirt steak and sliced mushrooms this weekend, both big hits this weekend and easy to put together, underwent the same rough marinade: big glugs of balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, and olive oil; generous shakes of garlic and onion powder; and sumac gifted from a Lebanese friend. If you’ve never cooked with sumac, it’s worth trying out—a tangy, bright pink powder that adds tang to anything it touches. Try it in a sauce, salad dressing, or right on top of your breakfast eggs.