EAT: The Social Life of Food

Description

EAT: The Social Life of Food examines the dynamic relationship between people and food. The exhibit explores different ways that people interact with food from preparation, to eating, and beyond. Food provides social and cultural sustenance as well as fuel for the body. This exhibit approaches food as a part of human life across temporal, cultural, and geographic distance through a unique and wide-range of objects from the Fleming Museum collection. The significance of preparing and sharing food is represented in a vareity of cultural contexts, inviting viewers to explore the social life of food both historically and personally. The exhibit explores the different social aspects that food fills: the before eating, the everyday eating, the elevated status food can take on, and the ways food can transcend into spiritual or ritualistic aspects of life. EAT looks at food as something that connects humanity, and as a basic element of human life that is often overlooked.

Credits

Created by the students of HCOL 186A: Introduction to Museum Studies, with thanks to the UVM Center for Teaching and Learning and the Fleming Museum.