Background
What you pay attention to, the choices you make, the hoaxes you fall victim to, the pop culture you consume, and even the things you keep in your bedroom can all offer insight into who you are. Each unit so far in this course has made you an investigator of yourself and your world; youÕre on a mission to identify and to make sense of why you do what you do. When you focus on the particulars of your life and reveal what they represent about you to others you can reveal yourself to yourself. In other words, you can find your way inside yourself by looking at yourself from the outside. To further clarify the point, being able to look at concrete, observable things and ask what bigger meanings they may hold can lead to interesting discoveries about you as well as make interesting academic inquiry.
The next object of our attention: food. The readings, class discussions, and the writing activities in this unit are intended to help you see that our food choices reveal more than just our personal preferences; they reveal our cultures, sub-cultures, our class, our internal conflicts, our attitudes towards others, our commitment to our own health, and how our appetites are often exploited by those who wish to make make money at our expense. Food, both the food we choose and the food we are repulsed by, can serve as an artifact for us as we seek, like archaeologists, to ÒunearthÓ the realities about ourselves, our behaviors, and our society. Dig in!
What To Do
Observe and/or recall the various food norms of the culture(s)/community(s) in which you consider yourself an insider, including those you grew up in and those you're part of now. Compare and contrast.
In a 3.5-5-page essay, help your reader to see what these show about what this community (or self) values or cares about, what its (or your) circumstances and concerns are. In other words, explain how food choices or behaviors reveal the full complexity of your identity and the culture(s) that define you, to understand what it means that you eat burritos, hummus sandwiches, dog stew, McDonaldÕs salads, or BLT pizza.
In this essay, you must quote and/or paraphrase at least three times from Judy Y. ChuÕs essay ÒConsumed by the Other: What Spam MeansÓ as you attempt to find what your food items mean. Her methods of analysis and her conclusions (even if you're not writing about SPAM!) should help you explain why things taste good or bad to you. If you eat food that is represented by a recognizable icon, do you choose the food or the symbol of the food? Take a close look also at Pollan's "Happy Meals" and his analysis of American food culture. Where in his scheme does your eating fit? You may also quote from any of the other readings. Note, however, that your essays must focus on explaining your own food item, not theirs.
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