CORE C134   Soul Food

Investigates the traditions and symbolism of soul food for the black community in the United States and the black diaspora. Emerging in the mid 20th century, soul came to mean a feeling of one’s roots as described in black music and culture, a sense of racial history. Students focus on black foodways by exploring the historical, political, and cultural significance of soul food to the black community. Soul food is one part of a larger universe of dishes such as collard greens, corn bread, potato salad, gumbo, barbeque, fried catfish, black-eyed peas, and chicken bog, to name a few. Soul food tells a story of how black folks endured slavery and carry the traditions and history of that time into the present. Much more than physical sustenance, soul food is an object of meaning-making, inseparable from the cultural frameworks in which it is enmeshed. The practices of making and eating soul food are foundational to the black community’s survival. What people eat, how they eat, and who is doing the food preparation is every bit as much symbolic as it is rooted in biological survival. Ultimately food is an object of historical and philosophical inquiry. Students investigate black foodways through cookbooks, food media, cooking shows, and by eating and engaging with soul food in and around the Central New York area.