Asian Foodways in Migration

Course examines the foodways and food cultures of East Asia and global Asian diasporic communities. Why does food define us, beyond basic survival? What can food tell us about individuals, communities, and cultural flows across space and time? Topics include: food as environmental and bodily processes; food as language, history, cultural memory, religious practice, identity and national markers; food as history of plenitude and hunger; the discourse of food as danger (from foreignness to cannibalism to zoonotic contagion). Course aims to introduce different disciplinary approaches and methodologies through the focus on foodways. No prior study of Asian languages or cultures is required. Part of 'How do Asian cultural heritages circulate?' first-year Constellation.