Two of the best things I read this semester are:
– Tipton-Martin’s The Jemima Code for the way that it was able to tell a story through the context of food writing in a historical sense. This was the text that really drove home to me the idea that we all have a connection between ourselves and the food we make and eat. There is a reason we eat the way we do.
– Origins and evolution of the Western diet: health implications for the 21st century (http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/81/2/341) for the way that this text explained so well the crisis that the world faces if we continue to move towards a globalized diet modeled off of the Western diet. Essentially, this text explains, our bodies are not meant to consume this type of food. We have not had the time to adjust to this high calorie, low nutrient diet, and we might not ever. This text allowed me to explain why this type of diet is so bad for our health and has inspired a lot of thought in me about an issue in which I am very interested.

To me, you really have to break down this topic word by word. First, rhetoric. I took a course on rhetoric last semester and the general impression I got was that rhetoric is, in simplistic terms, modes of persuasion. Next, of. This was the word that brought me the most difficulty at the beginning of this course. I knew the definition of rhetoric and food, but the rhetoric OF food just didn’t make sense. At the end, now, I can look back and say that here “of” refers to two things. There is the food’s rhetoric. The food itself has a story, and like art is there for a reason whether you understand that reason or not. In a way, the existence of the food is trying to persuade you of that reason. But second, there is the food writing in which people try to persuade others of their own personal connection to food, whether that be through the way that they perceive the pain of a lobster in the same way as their own pain, or how arguing for the authenticity of their own hummus as some representation of the validity of their culture. And food? That includes everything from the most basic sources of what we would commonly perceive to be food – the ingredients, crops, origins, production, history – to the process of forming those ingredients into dishes, to eating.