 Forum: You Are What You Eat
Philosophy professor Yoko Arisaka remembers the first cookies she ever made. They were delicate French sugar cookies she baked in her high school cooking class, a distinctly foreign sweet that, in 1976, was still unknown in Japan.
“They signified a very Western sensibility to me: they tasted sweet and looked pretty,” she said.
That was perhaps Arisaka’s first insight into the cultural significance of food. Now, 25 years later, she is introducing an in-depth examination of what food means as part of The Davies Forum she is leading this semester. Titled “Our Food, Our Society: An Exploration of American Values,” the forum will investigate personal identity, culture, and social justice from the perspective of what we choose to eat.
“Food is such an important part of our daily lives but there hasn’t been much systematic study of food,” Arisaka said. “It often gets dropped from discussion.”
Topics will range from the role of food in shaping cultural identity and human relations to problems with food distribution and world hunger, vegetarianism, and the debate over biotechnology. Students are also required to take a one-day cooking class at the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco.
Speakers slated to participate in the forum include Merry White, an anthropology professor at Boston University who specializes in family studies and culinary anthropology; Tom Nolan, executive director of Project Open Hand, a non-profit organization that delivers food to people living with HIV/AIDS; and Richard Steven Street, a photographer and historian who has documented farm workers for more than 20 years. Their talks are open to the public.
Although a food lover herself, Arisaka said she is troubled by the common juxtaposition of big-money restaurants and soup kitchens on most city streets. One important aspect of the forum will be discussing issues of justice and responsibility around food.
“Right down the street from Fleur De Lys is St. Anthony’s soup kitchen,” Arisaka said. “One of the questions I want to ask is how do you position yourself regarding social obligations?”
Of equal interest to her is food education. She hopes to use the class to inquire into why people make poor nutritional choices, especially the poor and underprivileged. She calls the number of kids who grow up on junk food “a social problem of some kind.”
“It’s sad. I want to find out about the problem and solve it,” she said. “But how are you going to enforce something intimate like food choices?”
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