please go through the guideline and ask me if there is any question.

RLGN 1430 Food: Religious Concepts and Practices

Winter 2020

FINAL PROJECT (25% of final grade)

There will be three options (outlined below) for the final project. The final project can build on Assignment One (the self-paced food activity), Assignment Two (documentary review), or Assignment Three (food memory reflection, or “eating/not eating”).

As a component of preparing the final project, each student will be expected to work out how to incorporate new self-paced food activities, some additional resources, and/or locating information and materials into previous assignment work, following the tips, prompts, and suggestions which are outlined here in the guidelines.

FORMAT: 4 to 5 pages, related to Option One, Option Two, or Option Three.

Option One: at least two to three pages of written text, plus supporting materials (field notes, visuals, menus, recipes and/or web resources)

Option Two: at least two to three pages of written text, plus supporting materials (menus, recipes, course readings, course resources (i.e., documentaries), and/or web resources)

Option Three: at least two to three pages of written text, plus supporting materials (field notes, visuals, menus, recipes, course readings, and/or web resources)

DUE DATE: The final project will be due on the last day of classes of Winter Term, Wednesday April 12, 2023, by 11:59 PM, to UM Learn.

OPTION ONE (Based on Assignment One)

All social anthropologists when doing fieldwork will keep a comprehensive journal or field notes concerning their understanding of the material they encounter during daily participant observation. It is a record of events and an interpretation of those events. Field notes include descriptive details, questions that are raised by new circumstances, and demonstrate a general engagement with the fieldwork context, such as noting sometimes very ordinary facts and conversations, or public discourse, about the topic the fieldworker is trying to understand.

In a similar way- and as you have already developed in your first short assignment- you are writing your field notes based on one of the following topics focused on the food culture and religion in Winnipeg.

For your selected topic, you will be expected to self-pace your work and research as to find evidence, based on an estimated amount of an additional two to three hours of observation, participation, conversation, eating(!), cooking, and shopping. You will be expected to indicate in some structured manner how the two to three hours were spent. This evidence can be in the form of handwritten notes, photographs, menus, interviews, recipes, packaging, etc.

Tips:

1- go grocery shopping, take photos, log what you bought, and prepare your family recipe.

2- research the history of your family recipe

3- document through photos, menus, web sources, and examples from course readings and/or lecture notes “eating together” or “eating fast food alone.”

You can write in the first person, as it is your experiences and insights that will form the basis of your analysis, but you will then reflect on these from an anthropological perspective, addressing the social and cultural messages that are communicated through the fieldwork topic you are addressing.

Each paper will be between 4-5 pages. Please include your reference pages and attached field notes, such as pictures, adverts, menus, etc, as separate pages. These materials can be presented in different formats. They are included in the page count of your project.

You will be marked on your ability to:

Apply and discuss concepts from the course such as the nature of diets, the characteristics of cuisine, the eating event, etc.

Draw upon a wide range of relevant sources of food culture

Interrogate and assess the nature of food culture within the topic you are addressing

Present appropriate descriptions, facts, examples, and comparisons, based upon your participant-observation and research, with citations

Ask valid questions, reveal your curiosity, and put forward plausible answers

Integrate your facts with interpretation and analysis

Apply an anthropological perspective, i.e. fieldwork based, culturally relative, comparative, and holistic

Include evidence of your hours of fieldwork for each paper by attaching documents and time sheet.

You will choose one of the following self-paced food activities:

a) Diets: Eat Your Way To…

While humans have very specific nutritional needs we have also culturally shaped the solution to those needs through our learned tastes and style of eating. Humans have long wrestled with our ability to use food to shape our bodies, and evidence of this comes from the numerous “diets” that are available for anyone to eat their way to health, fitness, tummy flatness, intelligence, morality, etc. One quick Google search of “diets” brings at 21 million responses! This paper will involve thinking about the diets that surround us in the media, and the pressure that exists to shape your body to some arbitrary standard. You may want to focus upon one diet, or contrast two that have very different methods, such as a get thin quickly diet, versus a lifestyle change diet to combat diabetes. You will need to think about the implications of diets, and how they relate to society’s obsession with the way we look.

b) Family Recipe

There is often a particular dish that is a favourite in a family. Where did this come from? Whose recipe is it? Why is it important? What are the ingredients? What is the method? How is it served? When is it made? Is this a written recipe, or made from memory? Interview a family member about the recipe and its significance. If possible make the recipe yourself and reflect on the significance of this enculturation. Explore the importance of this recipe for you and your family, and when you would eat it together. You will need to describe your family background, and briefly note the occasions when the recipe is used.

c) Gastropolitics: Eating Together

This paper will allow you to examine the social and cultural dynamics of the “eating event” that you, your family, and/or friends engage in. You will address what the meal consists of and whether it is a special or an everyday meal. How many courses? The table settings, seating arrangements, order of serving, and conversations all contribute to understanding the implications of the meal for defining tightly-knit social groups. You should choose an actual meal you have recently attended, and think about why such meals are so important to all humans, and what they tell us about our social structure.

d) Fast Food: Eating Alone

Explore your own eating habits by considering the fast food meals you have during the day when you’re working or at school, and how the necessities of our “modern” life are catered to by fast food franchises. Should we still consider this eating, or is it feeding? You should consider the types of foods, social interactions, and the associated sense of satisfaction to be gained from these locations. What is the packaging like? What is the structure of the meal? How do you feel afterwards? What does this eating style tell us about the nature of society, and food culture?

e) Food Advertising

Think of the politics of food advertising—remember someone is trying to convince you to eat their product, by making appeal to health, nutrition, price, nostalgia—through some means. Take your local newspaper and look at the food advertising contained in adverts and flyers. You could also look at what food items you have in your kitchen or what you buy when you go to the grocery. Are there reasons why you buy and eat certain foods? What messages are being communicated? Are certain foods advertised to attract different age groups, genders, ethnic groups? What tells you this? Do some carry misleading messages? Do they suggest a certain lifestyle, health benefit? Are they convincing?

f) Authentic or Traditional Food Heritages

Take the opportunity to go and taste the cuisine of another food heritage. You should choose a restaurant providing a style of food you have not tried before. Do some research into the cuisine, so that you begin to learn the standard dishes, and styles, and then compare your research to the real thing. You can explore this form of culinary tourism with a friend, if you wish, and you may include their experiences and thoughts. You will need to draw upon the characteristics of cuisines, notions of authenticity, and domestication. You may write about the cuisine your presentation will be focused on. What are the ways that your experiences of another food heritage help you to understand concepts of “authenticity” as well as “traditional dishes”?

OPTION TWO (Based on Assignment Two)

Be sure, as well, to consult the Style Guide. 4-5 pages, double-spaced in a font sized similarly to 12pt Times, plus bibliography (“Works Cited”).

There are three ways to focus your final project. These are three recommended approaches, related to the three documentary films that are part of our class resources. Please develop your topic and focus of discussion from Assignment Three, using one of the following documentaries:

1- “The Last Supper”

2- “Super Size Me”

3- “Fordson: Faith, Fasting, and Football”

As part of developing both your discussion and analysis, Option Two requires that you choose one of the following approaches related to the issues and themes in the documentaries. You will do this by developing further your work from Assignment Three by:

1- Using one to two course readings

2- Locating one to two relevant web resources

3- Locating one to two relevant academic publications

OPTION THREE (Based on Assignment Three)

Food Memory- Eating or Not Eating

Format: 4-5 pages, double-spaced, 12 point font, including fieldnotes, visuals, recipes, online resources, and/or “Works Cited”.

Write a first-person narrative description of a food memory, preferably from your childhood, or from some other point in your life. This could be a memory of tasting a particular dish or food for the first time, liking/disliking a particular food, or it could be a memory focused on a particular eating event- a “food event”- collective or individual.

You may also focus on a memory related to not eating certain foods and/or practices of abstaining from a certain food (i.e., fasting, food restrictions, religious dietary laws, allergies, or other restrictions). What were those very particular foods (= here please aim to define and describe the cultural, social and religious reasons for restricting these food items) that could not ever be eaten, and why? How was abstaining and refraining explained and what imagery was used to present food items as inedible, polluting, disgusting, and impure?

As you write about your food memory, think as well about the following: what do you remember specifically? How do you feel now about these recollections from the past? How is memory linked to food and eating? What do you remember about the social contexts and family settings? Do you feel that your recollections are very complete or not as complete as you expected?

Please pay attention to as many senses as you can invoke to evoke this memory. Interpret this food memory about eating or not eating, situate its significance to you personally, as well as for what it might reveal about your enculturation into particular food cultures and/or foodways.

Include one of the following:

a). If you recalled a dish at a specific event, interview and discuss with others who were also present and see how they remember the dish and the event; analyze the similarities and discrepancies between your recollections. Compile notes from your interview(s) and include them in your Final Project.

b). If you remembered a specific dish, find recipes for it and/or interview and discuss with others who were also present. See if you can also find multiple, slightly different recipes for a dish related to a food heritage, or a regional dish (say, baklava, butter cake, cabbage rolls, black eyed peas, or…?).

See how many varieties you can collect from friends, family members, and other sources (take a look in Better Homes and Gardens, or some other standard cookbook common in North America, or in relation to your food heritage and culture, or the internet for a general recipe). Include these varieties in how to make this specific dish as part of your field notes for the Final Project.

c). Prepare and eat this specific food and re-create the “food memory.” Record your thoughts, emotions, experiences of eating. In what ways does eating this specific food bring back your memories? In what ways does it not?

d). In terms of not eating particular foods, fasting, and food restrictions, see how you can situate your food memory of “not eating” in relation to one or two of our class resources (and readings) *or* locate one or two relevant online resources to situate and add more interpretation to your discussion. Include this additional discussion and material in your Final Project.