A History of Activism through Cookbooks (Online)
Taught by Sarah Lohman
Sarah Lohman is a culinary historian and the author of the bestselling and critically acclaimed book Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine. She focuses on the history of American food as a way to access stories of women, immigrants, and people of color, and to address issues of racism, sexism, and xenophobia. Her work has been featured inTheWall Street Journal andThe New York Times, as well as onAll Things Considered; and she has presented across the country, from the Smithsonian Museum of American History in Washington, DC to The Culinary Historians of Southern California. She is also 1/2 of the Masters of Social Gastronomy, a monthly food science and history talk at Caveat NYC, with Brainery co-founder Jonathan Soma.
Food has often been a way for activist communities to fundraise, connect, and spread the word about their cause.
We'll look at the origins of the link between food and activism with the abolitionist food writers of the Civil War. We'll unpack suffrage cookbooks from the turn of the 20th century and the earliest LGBTQ cooking pamphlets from the 1906s. Finally, we'll analyze the People's Cookbook of Philadelphia, a community of organizers depicted through recipes. Lastly, we'll talk about how food is still used to connect and advocate for causes to this day.
