All posts filed under: Random Wonderfulness

How I Pack for Summer Academic Conferences

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Friends have asked me for this for years, so here goes: a post on how I pack light for summer academic conferences! Note: this is not the post where I defend fashion within professional academic contexts as a feminist issue, though I have lots of thoughts on said topic. I leave for the 2018 AFHVS/ASFS Conference tomorrow (yay!), so here I present my three outfits for attending sessions and four outfits for casual receptions and sightseeing—though there are many more combos to be had here! Beyond these separates, I packed pajamas, a top and bottom for working out, underthings, makeup, and toiletries—all in my fav weekender bag, with space leftover to bring a few new books home!   A few tips: I have good luck with A-line or tube-shaped skirts in stretchy fabrics. They pack tiny, don’t wrinkle, mix and match a million ways, and keep your legs out and cool, if your conference is somewhere toasty. Wear a cardigan/sweater and a scarf/wrap on the plane, so you’ve got layers if you need them during …

Why Budweiser’s “America” Rebrand Matters

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Yesterday, Anheuser-Busch announced plans to rebrand Budweiser as “America” from late May through the November elections. Citing upcoming events like the 2016 Olympic Games, the Copa América soccer tournament (which will be held in the US for the first time), and the fall’s presidential election, Ricardo Marques, a vice president at Budweiser, declared it will “probably the most American summer of our generation.” It’s an event that Anheuser-Busch is keen to capitalize upon, though the invocation of “our generation” is interesting as “Millennials” (if we even exist as something more than a marketing category) are some of the least likely consumers to be purchasing packs of “America” this summer. Relatedly, Anheuser-Busch aims “to inspire drinkers to celebrate America and Budweiser’s shared values of freedom and authenticity.” This latter value seems particularly contentious given the ever-increasing market share of craft beers, which trade upon (perhaps equally constructed) notions of authenticity, identity, and lifestyle. Budweiser has directly targeted this tension, as their 2015 Super Bowl spot and subsequent ads throughout the year spread a distinctly anti-craft message, which can’t be separated from the brand’s subsequent claims to Americanness. Anti-craft messaging aside, this rebranding of a national …

Why I Support Render, Feminist Food Writing & Activism

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As its website states, Render: Feminist Food & Culture Quarterly works in every issue “to spotlight all the badass women who are making waves within the persistently male-dominated food industry.” These efforts “to smash the patriarchy in the food industry” are important for all of us, as readers, thinkers, and eaters. It’s why I renewed my subscription and contributed to Render’s Kickstarter, which ends on May 4. I’m not part of the Render team, but as pledges currently fall short of their goal, I wanted to offer these few words of support, because these issues have been top of mind for me lately. In our course, “Food and Gender in U.S. Popular Culture,” my students and I have discussed and pondered, sighed and screamed about not only the continual under-representation of women in the food industry and the media that covers it, but also about how the icon of the celebrity chef — constructed as white, male, and straight — is a cultural figure that by its very nature subordinates every other identity within the industry. This particular construction of the celebrity …

3 Posts to Toast Julia Child’s 102nd Birthday

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Today would have been Julia Child’s 102nd birthday and with her towering height, booming voice, vivacious personality, and insatiable appetite for food, eating, cooking, and learning new things, we can be sure she would have celebrated in style. As a graduate of the MLA in Gastronomy Program at Boston University—the program co-founded by Julia Child with Jacques Pépin to secure a place in higher education for the serious study of food—I share with my BU colleagues a borderline-cult-like love for all things Julia. I celebrated this week by finally reading Laura Shapiro’s biography of Julia Child, which is a petite book that perfectly captures the stages of Julia Child’s life, love, and career. I also spent some time writing an article for Zester Daily, comparing Julia’s advice on wine to that offered by other cookbooks published around the same time. One of the things I most love about Julia is how she expects, encourages, and supports readers to rise to the challenge, whether it be mastering French cuisine or perfectly pairing wines. Like any good teacher, her own love for learning …

Food and Matriarchy in “Sons of Anarchy”

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While Charlie Hunnam‘s handsome face and blonde locks are reason enough for anyone to be watching Sons of Anarchy with unwavering interest, after watching the first five seasons, I’m struck by the way that scenes of eating express the harmony or discontent of the motorcycle club (MC). As its members seek to protect the interests of their aptly named hometown of Charming, California, as well as their families and their MC brothers against drugs, violence, and general discord, three meals mark the club’s progress. Notably, the presence and absence of these meals reflect the changing power and influence of the family matriarch, Gemma Teller-Morrow (Katey Sagal). Spoiler alert: If you haven’t yet watched the show and think you might like to, I’d suggest getting up to speed before reading further. Family is a strong theme throughout Sons of Anarchy, as members of the club treat one another as brothers, willing to fight, kill, and die to protect one another and those dear to them. While these family-like ties grow apparent throughout the first episodes, they are also made …

The Agony and the Ecstasy—of Eating

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While we often think of eating as a supremely pleasurable experience, there are also times when eating brings pain, which can be wholly unwelcome or fully enjoyed. Rozin defines pain as “a negative experienced state that we avoid and that we try to reduce or eliminate” (1999: 5). And yet, there are numerous instances in which we do not avoid, reduce, or eliminate painful eating experiences. From late night, drive-through tacos that leave one’s stomach a bit unsettled to that ready-to-burst feeling that follows overeating at Thanksgiving dinner, we often fail to prevent moderately painful gastric distress. Pain can also find us by accident, as we cry out when a momentary mishap of the teeth causes us to bite down on our inner cheek or when we burn our tongues on a hot soup that we are too eager to try. Specific foods, however, bring a pain that at least some of us welcome and seek on purpose. Spicy foods set our tongues and lips on fire. Pickled foods render the inside of our mouths …

Cooking Up a Storm at the 2013 Cookbook Conference

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The Roger Smith Cookbook Conference in New York City drew an eclectic mix of culinary scholars; food studies academics; food writers and bloggers; food photographers and stylists; cookbook writers, editors and publishers; chefs; and those hoping to become any of the above. I participated in the panel, “Cookbooks as Works of Art and Status Objects,” which explored the slew of elaborate and expensive cookbooks that have come out recently that function as coffee table books more so than cookbooks. Examples include: The French Laundry Cookbook, The Big Fat Duck Cookbook, Alinea, Eleven Madison Park, NOMA, and Modernist Cuisine. The panel also featured Kim Beeman, Jane Black, Sarah Cohn, and Anne McBride, each of us bringing a different perspective to the nature and meaning of these cookbooks. I discussed these cookbooks as extensions of the trophy kitchen, given their ornamental nature and status-making potential. I also attended several other panels, which I summarize in this post. I have captured what I found to be the most tantalizing sound bites from panelists, but I have by no means provided an …