I am in the process of drafting my course description for next semester's themed composition course. Suggestions (both for this draft, and for readings) warmly solicited . . .

Food Fights: The Pleasures and Politics of Eating

Writing about food is a deeply personal, and often a deeply pleasurable experience. Marcel Proust, in the most literary of terms, remembers his childhood through the scent of cookies, while anyone who has ever read Laura Esquivel’s Like Water for Chocolate can virtually smell her quail in rose petal sauce. But like all pleasurable experiences, writing and thinking about food is also embroiled in debate at every turn, as Upton Sinclair proved by changing minds and turning stomachs with The Jungle. For example: Research suggests that food preferences are as unique to our identity as any other component of our personality. Genetically engineered foods promise utopian results and provoke Frankensteinian fears. Eating disorders plague women (and men) across the country, while advocates for vegetarian practices variously cite morality, health, and environmental well-being to support their choices. In short, our food is as troubling as it is satisfying. This semester, we will explore the pleasures and the politics of eating through a range of writing about food. We’ll look at texts like Ruth Ozeki’s My Year of Meats, Madeline George’s “The Most Massive Woman Wins,” and shorter food writing from connoisseurs and cultural critics alike. At the same time, we’ll be doing our own food writing, ranging from restaurant reviews, to rhetorical analyses of other food writers, to extended research papers with food-related topics like Frankenfoods, body image, world hunger, or vegetarianism.