Laura and I decided to collaborate on our topic for this
week’s discussion. We felt it was important to talk about our personal
connections to food and examine food as more than just a source of sustenance.
We both felt strongly that the loss of a spiritual connection to food can be
damaging to oneself and ultimately damaging to the food system as a whole. We
want to address the shift from thinking of food as nourishment for your whole
body and spirit rather than purely as fuel.
The article Spiritual Nutrition: Feeding the Body, Nourishing the Spirit introduces the idea of ‘mindful eating’. In the context of this article, eating mindfully means being present in the moment while eating a meal with one’s complete focus on the food they are consuming. Just thinking about the past two weeks, it has been a while since I have had a mindful eating experience. While trying to balance work, school, and other aspects of life it can be difficult to find time to enjoy a meal let alone prepare one. It is hard for me to think of a time where I ate a meal alone without multi-tasking. In our fast paced society often times ‘taking a break’ to eat seems like giving up. The article presents the notion that eating for health and eating for well-being are two different things. Nutritional science in the U.S. has been primarily focused on what you are eating to stay healthy rather than how you are eating which benefits your well-being.
Take a look at this short article about food and culture: http://ideas.ted.com/what-americans-can-learn-from-other-food-cultures/
Amy Choi talks about food in terms of: Identity, Survival, Status, Pleasure, Community, and Humanity.
I think the idea of food as a link to our humanity is particularly enlightening, especially the final quote from Richard Wilk that ends with “Learning to eat is learning to become human”. All animals eat (and all organisms gain energy in some way) but the way in which we have turned eating into a ritualistic experience separates us from other life forms.
What does food culture mean to you? Do you think the United States has any kind of unifying food culture? How does this culture/ lack thereof change our personal relationships to food?
As much as everyone feels comfortable doing so, Laura and I want everyone to reflect on their own journey with food and how their relationship to mealtime and eating has transformed throughout your life.
During elementary school my parents worked a lot and we did not have many meals all together. After school I would go to an after school program at the local YMCA until my dad got off work at 9. A snack was usually provided right after school during homework time. About half the kids would get picked up for dinner while others would stay later and get meals from the vending machines. My brother and I would usually buy snacks until our dad came and we had a quick microwavable or fast food dinner before bed. Meals were very rushed. During that time I do not think I thought too much about what I was eating or really how I was eating it nor was I encouraged to do so.
I think my true relationship with food began when I was old enough to go home myself after school and learn how to make food that I wanted to eat. My mom began working less in high school and taught me how to cook. While I do not feel a strong cultural connection to any particular dish growing up, I do think I was able to value food differently once I had the time to prepare it and enjoy it.
Reflect on your relationship with food. How can you strengthen your spiritual connection to the food you eat? How can strengthening our personal connections to food help support others and change our food system?
We all come from different backgrounds and have varying perspectives to offer to the broader discussion on the food system. Hopefully thinking about cultural and spiritual connections to food can help us to generate some solutions to food-related issues in the United States.
The article Spiritual Nutrition: Feeding the Body, Nourishing the Spirit introduces the idea of ‘mindful eating’. In the context of this article, eating mindfully means being present in the moment while eating a meal with one’s complete focus on the food they are consuming. Just thinking about the past two weeks, it has been a while since I have had a mindful eating experience. While trying to balance work, school, and other aspects of life it can be difficult to find time to enjoy a meal let alone prepare one. It is hard for me to think of a time where I ate a meal alone without multi-tasking. In our fast paced society often times ‘taking a break’ to eat seems like giving up. The article presents the notion that eating for health and eating for well-being are two different things. Nutritional science in the U.S. has been primarily focused on what you are eating to stay healthy rather than how you are eating which benefits your well-being.
Take a look at this short article about food and culture: http://ideas.ted.com/what-americans-can-learn-from-other-food-cultures/
Amy Choi talks about food in terms of: Identity, Survival, Status, Pleasure, Community, and Humanity.
I think the idea of food as a link to our humanity is particularly enlightening, especially the final quote from Richard Wilk that ends with “Learning to eat is learning to become human”. All animals eat (and all organisms gain energy in some way) but the way in which we have turned eating into a ritualistic experience separates us from other life forms.
What does food culture mean to you? Do you think the United States has any kind of unifying food culture? How does this culture/ lack thereof change our personal relationships to food?
As much as everyone feels comfortable doing so, Laura and I want everyone to reflect on their own journey with food and how their relationship to mealtime and eating has transformed throughout your life.
During elementary school my parents worked a lot and we did not have many meals all together. After school I would go to an after school program at the local YMCA until my dad got off work at 9. A snack was usually provided right after school during homework time. About half the kids would get picked up for dinner while others would stay later and get meals from the vending machines. My brother and I would usually buy snacks until our dad came and we had a quick microwavable or fast food dinner before bed. Meals were very rushed. During that time I do not think I thought too much about what I was eating or really how I was eating it nor was I encouraged to do so.
I think my true relationship with food began when I was old enough to go home myself after school and learn how to make food that I wanted to eat. My mom began working less in high school and taught me how to cook. While I do not feel a strong cultural connection to any particular dish growing up, I do think I was able to value food differently once I had the time to prepare it and enjoy it.
Reflect on your relationship with food. How can you strengthen your spiritual connection to the food you eat? How can strengthening our personal connections to food help support others and change our food system?
We all come from different backgrounds and have varying perspectives to offer to the broader discussion on the food system. Hopefully thinking about cultural and spiritual connections to food can help us to generate some solutions to food-related issues in the United States.
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ReplyDeleteFood has always had a spiritual quality in my life. Growing up, my family came together around cooking and eating meals together. However, since coming to college, I have realized that food is much more complex than the nutritional value and the cultural significance of family recipes and childhood memories. Recently, I have been examining other aspects of my connection to food; thinking more about where my food comes from and how my consumption impacts others. I think by being conscious of both what we are eating and being conscious while we eat it, our consumption can be a representation, and extension, of our spirituality. One of the best ways to strengthen our spiritual connection to the food we eat is to participate in the process (growing and cooking) and build relationships with and the growers and our communities and with the land. I think one of the most spiritual experiences that we can have is eatting food that represents our values, celebrates community, and is grown and prepared with love for everyone and everything involved. This intentionality of course will not only promote and protect our own humanity, but will also inherently support systems built around the humanity of all people and our spiritual connections with the earth and each other.
ReplyDeleteI definitely don't think we give food enough credit for what it does for us, on all of the levels that Elisse and Laura both brought up. I know that when I eat what my body tells me to, I have more energy, sleep better, and am in a better mood. I also think this happens more so when I cook for myself, because I know what I'm putting into my body and I feel a sense of accomplishment for doing something good for myself, and sometimes even for others.
ReplyDeleteI know that in traditional Chinese culture, food is taken into high consideration for a soul's well-being, and when you know what element you are (wood, fire, earth, metal, water... http://treelite.com/quizzes/chinese-constitutional-quiz/ ), you can determine what types of food will feed all of you, and what will make you ill.
On the other side of that, I recently watch a documentary called "Fed Up" which charted childhood obesity in the US, and pointed to processed food as being the main culprit. Kids who have to eat school lunches endorsed by fast food companies, kids whose parents don't have enough of a budget to dodge all of the "filler" foods, kids who are addicted to sugar from an early age because of over processed baby formula and food; all of these kids struggle with obesity, and for many reasons that they cannot control. It was clear that the main children (ages 10-16) interviewed in the documentary struggled with their relationship to food. They craved it constantly, saw friends and siblings eat the same junk with no thickening of the waistband, and yet these kids also hated what the food was doing to their bodies and wanted to reject it. But they were all so addicted to the high sodium and sugar contents. My guess is that if I were to ask these kids if they thought they had a spiritual connection to food, they would say no or laugh in my face.
I agree that the best way to build a healthy, soulful relationship with food is to be more present with it in all of its stages. If we are aware of an eggplant for more than just something to put in our mouths, but also as having a life of its own, we can be more appreciative of both the plant and our own bodies and what we want to put into them.
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ReplyDeleteSince I was a young child my mom has worked nights. However, both she and my dad were committed to creating times for us to eat together and growing up there was always a family dinnertime and we were expected to be there. Until I got to college, I didn’t realize how special these times were and how the experience of eating dinner together had instilled in me the commitment to eat in community.
ReplyDeleteFor me, one of the most beautiful aspects of food is the way that it brings people together. Some of my favorite memories have occurred around tables. For example, my first-year at K I would spend hours in the caf, laughing and talking with friends. The food wasn’t great, but it did gather us together in the same place. It was from these times that I learned the most about my friends and these were the times when we began forming a community.
Since my first-year, I have continued to think about the place food has in building community. Often community-building can, for me, be linked to a spiritual process as well. Right now I live with three other women and each night of the week one of us makes dinner and shares it with the others. We try to all be at dinner at the same time and this has created an incredible opportunity for us to grow closer. It is at these dinner conversations when conversations about life, spirituality, and the future have been held. Additionally, because we share our food costs communally, this has prompted numerous conversations about what we value in our food purchasing. So often food purchasing becomes another chore that I try to complete as quickly as possible, but because I’ve had to think critically about buying food for others too, I am more critical about what I am buying or what I want to buy. When I think of transforming our food system this conversation with others stage seems really important. Slowing down in general and having an actual conversation about food purchasing can really transform one’s thinking. For me, these conversations happen most naturally in community, when individual thinking becomes collective thinking.
Without a doubt, there has been a transition throughout my life in regards to my relationship with food. During my early childhood, family dinners were always a priority. Through those dinners, my relationship to food had a strong connection to how I interact with people. I wasn’t only feeding my physical body; I was also feeding my social, psychological, and emotional needs. However, as the years passed, everyone and everything began to change, including our relationship to food. Both of my parents began working and my older brothers were busy with school and jobs. Meals transitioned from home-cooked dinners at the kitchen table, to grabbing a quick bite between school, work, etc. (often these meals were fast-food). It was quick, easy, and cheap—completely satisfying our capitalist needs for mass and easy consumption. This relationship to food became more obvious to me when I entered K. With classes, sports, and other extracurricular activities happening, my relationship to food became weaker until I went on study abroad and was reintroduced to a culture that takes pride in its focus on the importance of food in various aspects of ones life. Because we live in such a fast-paced, capitalist society, I believe we often forget to slow down and remember that our bodies are sacred and therefore, the nutrition of our bodies is sacred. I’m really looking forward to talking about this more in class. Thanks for bringing this topic into the conversation!
ReplyDeleteMy relationship to food has grown exponentially in the past few years. Growing up, I was usually fed whatever was quickest and easiest. Neither of my parents liked to cook – it was seen as a hassle and something they didn’t want to do after a long day at work. We typically ate pre-cooked frozen food from Costco that one of my parents would throw in the oven half an hour before dinnertime. Though we always made a point to eat dinner together as a family, we were usually finished at the table within 10 to 15 minutes.
ReplyDeleteBeyond that, my siblings and I were extremely picky eaters. We enjoyed processed, sugar-laden foods. I found an old photo of myself the other day walking through Target carrying no less than 6 boxes of Berry Kix, a McDonalds “fruit” smoothie balanced on top of them. My siblings and I would go through those 6 boxes of sugary Kix in less than a week.
When I was at my wits end with my eczema, my sister suggested I try a paleo diet. This was around a year and a half ago. That’s when my relationship to food really began to change. I began to realize that what I had thought was my normal, everyday self was actually fraction of the self that I could be when I wasn’t bombarding my body with inflammatory foods.
I began to learn more about the effects of different foods on my body and really began to prioritize purchasing local, organic produce, and being connected to the source of my food. I now think of food first and foremost as nourishment. The sourcing and preparation of good, healthy food has now become a priority in my life. I struggle with my opinion of spirituality, but I can say with certainty that good food gave me back my vitality and improved my quality of life.
It’s easy to get bogged down with discussions about “the system” and everything that’s wrong with it, so I think this topic will be a nice change of pace. Growing up, my family had meals together pretty often. However, like some of you, this seemed to happen less and less as I got older. I was involved in SO many extracurricular activities and usually ended up just grabbing food in between practices, rehearsals, or games. As someone who likes to stay quite busy, this didn’t change very much once I entered college. I still often find myself grabbing a protein bar while running out the door. I’ve improved in some ways though. I’ve been trying to fully commit to a few responsibilities rather than saying “yes” to every opportunity that arises. So in general, I’m a little less busy than in the past. I’ve also become much more aware of our food systems, and I cook more than in high school. In these ways, I’ve become more connected to my food and have been able to prioritize food more.
ReplyDeleteBut on the other hand, I have dealt with and am still dealing with disordered eating habits. This is really really difficult to talk about, and I’ve never actually talked about it with anyone. But I definitely use food as a way to numb my feelings and emotions. I “stress eat” often, and find myself eating when I’m sad, bored, or sometimes just out of habit. Afterwords, this sometimes comes with feelings of guilt or shame. I feel pressure to look a certain way, especially as someone who wants to make dance my career. The nature of dance involves criticism, scrutiny, and ultimately judging the way someone looks. For me, sometimes I get into the mindset of “If I just lost 5 pounds, this step would be that much easier, a company might want to hire me, etc.” Although not nearly as frequent now, it’s hard to reverse these damaging thoughts. I now realize that equating food with weight can be incredibly harmful. Talking about foods as “good” or “bad” can lead to a negative body image as well as a complete disconnection from food.
I’m working on strengthening my spiritual connection to food. It’s a daily struggle, but this class is helping. I’m learning about everything that goes into growing food, which is really important for making that connection. Thanks for making this a safe space to talk about this very personal issue. I’m truly looking forward to hearing everyone’s thoughts in class.
When I was a young kid, lunch was the big meal of the day. We called it "dinner". My mom would prepare a big meal, usually involving beef from our dairy cows and vegetables from the garden, then call my Dad and the hired hands in from fieldwork by ringing a big bell mounted on a pole outside the garage. During the summer months, we might have three or four sweaty and dirt-smeared young men at the table with us. Dishes were passed hand to hand as my Dad and the guys traded jokes and then everyone tucked into the meal. I remember enjoying those meals a lot and feeling part of a lively community sitting at that table.
ReplyDeleteThings changed pretty drastically in my family during my teenage years, however, as challenges in my parents' relationship sparked a deep depression in my mother that eventually lead to her hospitalization. This left me in charge of cooking for the men! Thankfully, Hamburger Helper came to my rescue!!
My family was never the same after my mother returned home. My father stopped joking at the table and tension was always in the air. It didn't help that this was the 80s and the dairy industry was in a crisis--I didn't know it at the time, but my Dad was probably constantly worried about losing the farm. What I did know what that mealtimes became excruciatingly tense. There were so many unresolved painful emotions in my family that we had no way to talk about that being forced to sit near each other for the duration of a meal was torturous. We still did it, but we ate in silence. About that time, I also began to use food as a means of suppressing those emotions that I had no outlet for. I would stuff myself late at night, eating whatever I could find in the cupboards until I was painfully full. It was like the pain of eating so much distracted me from the other emotional pain I was feeling.
It took a lot of therapy to heal my relationship with myself, which allowed me to work on healing my relationship with food as well. My relationship to my family I'm still working on!
On another note, the article that Elisse linked to made me think about food as a weapon of colonization. One solution to this has been "decolonization diets". Poet Craig Santos Perez has written about his own experiences with food and de-colonization. Here's an excerpt from a blog piece he wrote regarding the deaths of two young men of color (https://craigsantosperez.wordpress.com/2013/07/24/life-isnt-all-mcdonalds-and-skittles-for-trayvon-and-kollin/):
"Trayvon’s last meal was a bag of skittles. Kollin’s last meal was at a McDonald’s in Waikiki. While one trial is much more well-known than the other, both cases have sparked intense discussions about racial conflict, judicial injustice, and gun violence in the US. Tragically, the bodies of these young men of color were not only dehumanized by their assailants, but their bodies were also dehumanized from within, by the undigested food in their stomachs.
In addition to holding our children, siblings, friends, and loved ones a little tighter and a little longer before they leave the house, I beg that we also teach them about the dangers of McDonald’s and Skittles, about the racial violence lurking in our foods. Teach them how to eat healthy and nutritious foods. Remind ourselves, at each meal, that even our bodies of color deserve to be respected."
Thoughts?
I like that the article questions what can be defined as American cuisine. I wonder this myself from time to time and I have come to the same conclusion as the author in that meat has become a defining characteristic of this country's eating patterns. Why do so many American's feel that a meal is not complete without a meat component to it? I think being in Thailand has furthered my perspective in the matter. In the hill tribe communities, meat was a rarity reserved for celebration and giving thanks. Nourishing meals and protein sources were found in other ways that I don’t think are totally understood or even acceptable in many American homes today.
ReplyDeleteBeing a vegetarian I think has deepened my personal connection with food. Being the only one to abstain from eating meat in my family, I sort of became responsible for finding what foods I wanted to eat that met my nutritional needs. My connection with food is not so much eating it, but instead cooking it. Here at school, my housemates and I do our grocery shopping together and usually eat dinner altogether. In this way I have sort of become the resident cook. Cooking can be a very meditative process for me and I am fascinated by the way simple ingredients can come together to make something entirely new. Cooking and sharing what I have made with people is one of the easiest ways I can express my gratitude to the people I know.
Truly I have been lucky that I’ve always been brought up in a family that loves to cook. When I was younger my dad insisted I find a recipe, shop for the ingredients, and prepare a meal on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. I think this process has led me to be very experimental with spices and it’s something I see reflected in how I cook now. I think that my fascination and enjoyment of cooking has been integral to my connection with food systems and trying to understand a way in which we can create an inclusive yet environmentally sound alternative to conventional agricultural systems.
Like I said on Laura's post, I think one way to have a more spirtual experience with food is to do more focused or mindful eating. The aspect of culture you brought up in this post though is very interesting to me though. For me food is a huge part of my Jewish culture. It is sometimes the one of the only things that makes me feel connected to my culture. I lot of Jewish culture comes from the Jewish religion, and as a non religous person I don't find a lot of opportunity to take part in my culture here at K. At home I am surrounded by others who also participate in Jewish culture without participating in Jewish religion. Here at K I find most Jewish people on campus connnecting with other Jews through religous means so there isn't a lot of opportunity to celebrate my culture.
ReplyDeleteFood, however, is something that everyone relates to. Additionally it is a part of my culture to share food with others. Through food I am able to celebrate my culture with people who are not Jewish. They don't necessarily have to know my culture, or the history of my culture to celebrate my cultural foods! My cultural connection with food I think has taught me a lot of important values. For example, we are supposed to express gratitutde for our food, to share our food with others and to cook foods that are traditional. This has helped instill values of gratitude, generosity and appreciation of my heritage.
I think American food culture is one of convenience. In this way I think people buy food that doesn't nourish their bodies or spirits. Additionally, the value of convenience makes people careless about how their food is grown and who grows it. This leads to the exploitation of the earth and of others. I think if we had a radical change of values in the U.S. we could achieve a more positive cultural relationship with food. I feel grateful that my Jewish culture has connected me to food in a positive and healthy way!
Our cultural food is McDonalds and other "fast-food", unfortunately. We are an on-the-go society. With drive-thru windows, people don't even need to get out of their car. A lot of my buddies who work 9-5s back home get breakfast from McDonalds on their way to work every morning. Tons of Americans do the same. This fast-food society definitely encourages the line of thought that food is fuel and not much more, and an instant gratification approach to it all.
ReplyDeleteAs for how to strengthen our spiritual relationship to food, my personal answer has been to first seek to strengthen my relationship to the Most High, and living harmoniously with His ways will automatically ensure a healthy relationship to food, and other people too. Respect, love, and patience are critical components to a healthy relationship of any kind. Food is no different. I have been making strides toward slowing down my meals (but I must admit, it's hard to change old habits). Eating is kind of like a conversation, and we need to listen as well. I'm sure we've all tried to talk to our friends while they were distracted by their phones - it's simply not cool. Food deserves our attention and I'm trying every day to give it just that. Foods are the fruits of our natural world, and slowing down to appreciate any and every thing natural is a step in the right direction. Whether that's sitting outside for a while to do some bird-watching (the cardinals in my yard are quite captivating), or taking the time to cut up some veggies and savor each bite. As long as we keep walking down the path to whatever righteousness we are seeking and stay honest with ourselves, I think our spiritual relationships to food and many other things will improve tremendously.
The quote in your article of Lee’s Ted talk resonated with me: “what you want to cook and eat is an accumulation, a function of your experiences — the people you’ve dated, what you’ve learned, where you’ve gone.” This quote emphasizes to me how important other people, culture, and our own experiences continually shape what we nourish ourselves with on a daily basis. When I was younger a lot of my food habits were shaped by values my parents had taken on from greater food culture in the United States.
ReplyDeleteMy mom grew up on a farm. While not all of their practices are sustainable and organic, it was far from a factory farm. In my hometown farms and gardens are very common, land is cheap and the climate is moderate. Growing food and sharing it with your neighbors has always been proud work. FFA (Future Farmers of America) was by far the largest club at my high school; our high school parking lot was at least half full of pick-up trucks. However most farmers’ pride in growing food related a lot more to the McDonald’s video of good farming than the Potato Park one.
These same pick-up trucks that farm, are also the most common type of vehicle hanging out in the McDonald’s parking lot. Because an active, supportive community member owns the McDonald’s in my hometown, people often even feel good about going to McDonald’s in a way eerily similar to how good we feel about going to the farmer’s market and buying organic produce.
My parents always encouraged my consumption of fast food with lines like “eat it while you can," implying that the only value to food is how fat it makes you. Even after my dad got really sick and realized the importance of eating healthy and exercising, my parents still found no problem with me eating school lunches and picking up fast food after school. My mom hated cooking, so she was happy for me to eat anywhere but home. At the time I was super into that, because it gave me the freedom to be about with friends, and kind of seemed like a fuck you to the patriarchy at the same time. When I would babysit before school, it would always be a treat if I had extra time to stop at Hardee’s before class for a sausage biscuit and coffee, this is of course not the best way to start off your day.
When I got to college the importance of consuming food in a way that nourished my body and does not harm the planet really started to make more sense. In Philadelphia where I had my own kitchen for the first time I taught myself a lot about cooking for myself in healthier ways. I went to farmers markets and the nearby co-op.
Now I still struggle with actually choosing food that is good for my body. Especially when I am busy and stressed, the inclination is to make whatever is easy, to order food so that I don’t have to put time and energy into my food. While quick, convenient food options do not have to be unhealthy or processed, it seems they typically are. Also when at home, I am frequently offered unhealthy meals from friends and family, but the love behind the offer makes it impossible to turn down. I still struggle to navigate this space, especially since it is often food that they are proud to call fresh, while I see it as covered in chemicals and cooked in processed sugars.
I think it's so important to start to question some of the common American values around food. We grow up learning that breakfast is the most important meal of the day and that we need to drink our milk to get enough calcium and that we should pay attention to the food pyramid. But it's so much more complicated than that! And I think we start to understand how personal eating is, and how we are really the only ones who can determine what our own bodies need. And no only bodies! But what foods make us comfortable, give us pleasure, tie to a certain memory. For me, food is so much about memory. I love being able to re-think a time in my live with so much more texture when I eat a food specific to that time. It's emotional and can be transportive. Sometimes I have a hard time balancing that with what I 'should' be eating, and how I determine that for myself. Deciding what to eat definitely gives me anxiety at times, and I'm interested in talking about that in class.
ReplyDelete