Food for Thought

Ever considered the history of food? What about the relationship between food and emotion? Or the importance of historical research in fighting climate change?

These are just some of the questions discussed in ‘Let’s Talk About Food: In Conversation on the New World’, The John Rylands Library’s contribution to the Being Human Festival on Thursday 19 November.

Being Human is the UK’s national festival of the humanities run by the School of Advanced Studies, University of London in partnership with the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the British Academy. It aims to celebrate research in the humanities by making it accessible to non-specialist audiences, bringing together researchers, universities, cultural institutions, and members of the public. This year the theme for the festival was ‘New Worlds’.

The majority of the festival events took place online, and The John Rylands Library’s contribution was no exception. Our event, Let’s Talk About Food, consisted of a screening of a pre-recorded conversation between Dr Rachel Winchcombe, a cultural historian at the University of Leeds, and Professor Amanda Bamford, a plant scientist in the School of Biological Sciences. The screening was followed by a live Q&A on Zoom, and was attended by more than 80 people.

Amanda’s research includes the impacts of air pollution and global climate change on crop plants and agricultural production. Since 2017 she has been the University’s academic lead for Environmental Sustainability. Rachel’s research focusses on the role of food in the development of the early English colonies of North America and the Caribbean. In particular, she is interested in how the engagement of early settler colonists with new foods and environments impacted emotional states and relationships.

Amanda commented: “It was a revelation to me to talk to Rachel about the common themes around food and diets from early US settlers to climate change and food security. It highlighted the benefits of cross-discipline discussion and how looking to the past can inform the future, looking at the ‘long view”. Being in the iconic John Rylands brought home to me the weight of historical knowledge in such a beautiful setting!”

If you missed it, watch Amanda and Rachel’s conversation here.