I meant to post about this last fall, but in the harried I didn’t manage it, but better late than never, and I just want to say that it was a pleasure and a privilege being part of Professor Anna Guevarra‘s innovative food course.
Honestly, when I saw what she was doing, I was both impressed and a little jealous that I hadn’t thought of doing something like that — you totally could, on the literature front, as well as with the sociology approach she takes, using food as a way in to cultural conversations and analysis. Although it’s also a lot of work, how she does it, and I’d need to do a lot of prep to be able to do it nearly as well — maybe someday!
Structurally, it’s set up really well; she spends part of the class on the more academic side, and then part of it with students cooking and serving food from different cuisines, then connecting that to the lecture and readings.
Just a terrific model, and I’d love to see more of this kind of teaching in the academy generally; I think the students get so much out of the real world, concrete manifestation of what can otherwise be rather abstract ideas. And of course, they get to eat delicious food, which is never a bad thing!
