Food Writing

Food writing is often associated with restaurant reviews or top ten lists. But, as a journalistic genre, food writing is less about defining taste or awarding rankings. It is an opportunity to examine one's self, senses, and surroundings. In this course, students practice food writing with this goal in mind. We discuss the ways food writing weaves the personal and political to critique the systems that govern the way we eat. We study the work of writers like Ruth Reichl, Jessica B. Harris, Siddartha Deb, Jiayang Fan, and Anthony Bourdain. Assigned readings cover personal identity, familial heritage, geopolitical conflict, environmental justice, business practices, and labor standards. We also identify and critique common food writing tropes to surface new ways of discussing what, and how, we eat. Over the course of the semester, students develop their own voice by crafting first-person essays, profiles, features, and recipes inspired by assigned readings, as well as completing one longform project.