Slow cooked: An unexpected life in food politics
This lively autobiography details Marion Nestle’s life-long engagement with food, particularly the tumultuous politics that inevitably accompany this central aspect of human life. As the founder of the interdiscipline of food studies, she describes…
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Version 1.0 - published on 19 Mar 2025 doi: 10.15353/cfs-rcea.v10i2.640 - cite this
Licensed under Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0
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This lively autobiography details Marion Nestle’s life-long engagement with food, particularly the tumultuous politics that inevitably accompany this central aspect of human life. As the founder of the interdiscipline of food studies, she describes her early life in academia, her work with the federal government and her appointment as a professor at New York University (NYU). Food studies scholars and practitioners will be fascinated by her insider stories of creating the field – from acquiring financial backing and finding qualified faculty to attracting students and bringing food influencers onside. To paraphrase Wendell Barry, eating is a political act, and no-one brings that to life more acutely than Marion Nestle.
Cette dynamique autobiographie raconte l’engagement de Marion Nestle envers l’alimentation tout au long de sa vie, en particulier les troubles politiques qui accompagnent inévitablement cet aspect central de la vie humaine. En tant que fondatrice des études interdisciplinaires sur l’alimentation, elle décrit ses débuts dans le milieu universitaire, son travail avec le gouvernement fédéral et sa nomination comme professeure à l’Université de New York. Les chercheurs, chercheuses, praticiens et praticiennes en études sur l’alimentation seront captivés par ses histoires de première main sur la création de leur champ – de l’obtention d’un soutien financier à la recherche d’un corps professoral qualifié, en passant par l’attraction d’étudiants et d’étudiantes, et le partenariat avec des personnes influentes dans le domaine de l’alimentation. Pour paraphraser Wendell Barry, manger est un acte politique et personne ne le manifeste aussi bien que Marion Nestle.
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Researchers should cite this work as follows:
- Sumner, J., (2025), "Slow cooked: An unexpected life in food politics", HSSCommons: (DOI: 10.15353/cfs-rcea.v10i2.640)
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Original publication: Sumner, Jennifer. "Slow cooked: An unexpected life in food politics." Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l'alimentation, vol. 10, no. 2, 2023, pp. 120-122. DOI: 10.15353/cfs-rcea.v10i2.640. This material has been re-published in an unmodified form on the Canadian HSS Commons with the permission of Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l'alimentation. Copyright © the author(s). Work published in CFS/RCÉA prior to and including Vol. 8, No. 3 (2021) is licensed under the Creative Commons CC BY license. Work published in Vol. 8, No. 4 (2021) and after is licensed under the Creative Commons CC BY-SA license. For details, see creativecommons.org/licenses/.
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Canadian Food Studies / La Revue canadienne des études sur l’alimentation
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