Keep a lookout for upcoming events and more details

September 2018
Slave Dwelling Project, Historic Charleston, and the Gaillard join for an ambitious event recognizing African-American cultural contributions on September 15th. Check out details for the event here.
We are sending two undergraduate AfAm students and Dr. Kameelah Martin, Director of African American Studies to “The Food of the African Diaspora,” a curated dinner with Dr. Jessica Harris! Stay tuned for the students’ photos and reactions from this experience.
This event was cancelled because of Hurricane Florence.

Women in the Kitchen
September 17th
5:00 – 7:00pm at the Le Creuset Atelier (116 Ripley Point Drive, Charleston 29407)
Join us for evening of cooking, eating, and conversation with some of the most dynamic women in the Charleston food scene. Learn from and about local women whose cooking draws from different global traditions and for whom the kitchen is a place of success, joy, spirituality, and purpose. Featuring:
Nathalie Dupree, Celebrity chef and native Charlestonian
Germaine Jenkins, Founder of Fresh Future Farm
Jill Mathias, Head Chef at Chez Nous
Hanna Raskin, Food Editor and Chief Food Critic at The Post & Courier
Sarah Refson, Rebbetzin at Chabad of Charleston and the Lowcountry
This event was cancelled because of Hurricane Florence.

 

October 2018
Chinese Movie and Moon Cake Night
Friday, October 12, 7:00-9:00p.m., Education Center, Room 116 (on St Phillip and Liberty)
Enjoy a free showing of Eat Drink Man Woman and a delicious treat, sponsored by the Chinese Association in Greater Charleston and
College of Charleston.

African Retentions: Lowcountry Foodways
Tuesday, October 23, 6:00 p.m., Addlestone Library, room 360 Learn from a panel discussion with Dr. Psyche Williams-Forson, a leading scholar of African-American foodways, and Chef Kevin Mitchell of the Culinary Institute of Charleston about Lowcountry cuisine and sustainability from an interdisciplinary perspective.
Contact Dr. Kameelah Martin, Chair of the African American Studies Program for more information (martinkl2@cofc.edu).

November 2018
Global Foodways Community Service Project

Tuesday, November 13, 2018, 6:30-7:30p.m, MUSC Children’s Hospital, 8th floor Family Lounge for NICU, PICU, and PCICU
A group of CofC faculty and students will participate in preparing and serving an internationally-themed meal to the families of critically ill kids at MUSC Children’s Hospital. Check out The College Today article that discusses the motivation behind creating this event. Additional photos of the event on the “sights and sounds” page above.

 

January 2019
3rd Annual Celebration of Food and Faith: A Dialogue between Muslims and Jews
Monday, January 28, 6:30-8:30p.m., Arnold Hall, 96 Wentworth St

Join the Charleston Interreligious Council in discussing and eating shared classic foods of the Jewish and Muslim religious traditions. The program begins with dialogue between Rabbi Michael Davies and Imam Shamu Shamudeen, moderated by Dr. Elijah Siegler, Chair of Religious Studies. This dialogue is followed by participant discussions about food traditions, prayer practices, pilgrimage, clothing, scripture and charity, all complemented by a sampling of traditional Jewish (Kosher) foods and Halal dishes from the Muslim world.

This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Religious Studies, the Yaschik/Arnold Jewish Studies Program, CofC Jewish Student Union/Hillel, The Mosque of Charleston, Interfaith Partners of South Carolina, and the Roper St. Francis Mission Department.
Contact Dr. Elijah Siegler, Chair of Religious Studies for more information (sieglere@cofc.edu).

Die Tafel en die Duiwel [The Table and the Devil]: Foodways and Displacement in the Cape of South Africa
Tuesday, January 29, 6:00p.m., ECTR 118 (Education Center on St. Philip at Liberty St)

Dr. Jonathan Highfield, Professor of Postcolonial Studies and Graduate Program Director of Nature, Culture and Sustainability Studies at the Rhode Island School of Design will deliver a lecture on the College of Charleston campus about how the food cultures of slaves from India, Java, and the Philippines, who were brought to South Africa during Dutch colonization, contributed to the invention of Cape Malay cuisine. Highfield is the author of, most recently, Food and Foodways in African Narratives: Community, Culture, and Heritage (Routledge, 2017). His visit to Charleston is co-sponsored by the African Studies Program and a grant from the College’s Sustainability Literacy Institute.
Contact Dr. Simon Lewis, Director of the African Studies Program, for more information (lewiss@cofc.edu).

February 2019

The Art and Pleasure of French Home Cooking: Cooking class with CofC French Studies Professor Dr. Lisa Signori
Monday, February 25, 3:30p.m.: conducted mostly in French language, McAlister Residence Hall 1st floor kitchen (102 St. Philip St)

Signori spent almost a decade living and working in France, where she learned classic French cooking technique and gained appreciation for using regional ingredients.
Contact Dr. Lauren Ravalico for more information (ravalicold@cofc.edu). Space limited and reservation required. If you would like to attend this event, please email Lauren Ravalico.

March 2019

Global Foodways/World Affairs Colloquium Series Speaker: Vicki Wilde, Gates Foundation
Monday, March 25, 5:30p.m., Alumni Center (School of Education, Health, and Human Performance, on St. Philip at Wentworth)

Vicki Wilde, Senior Program Officer in Agricultural Development and Women’s Economic Empowerment at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Wilde is responsible for the gender portfolio in Agricultural Development. In addition to managing grants aimed at empowering women in farming households, she works closely with the foundation’s teams for nutrition, crops, livestock, data and policy. Before joining the foundation in 2014, Wilde had several years’ work experience with smallholder farmers in Asia and Africa, on behalf of FAO, IFAD and WFP.

In 1999 the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) selected Wilde to set up the Gender & Diversity Program, working with 15 international agricultural research centers worldwide. In 2007, Wilde founded African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD), working across 11 countries of sub- Saharan Africa.

This event is co-sponsored by the Center for Public Choice and Market Process, the International Studies Program, and the Women’s and Gender Studies Program.

Want Not, Waste Not: The History, Culture, and Politics of LEFTOVERS
Thursday, March 28, 5:00p.m., Alumni Center (School of Education, Health, and Human Performance, on St. Philip at Wentworth)

Lecture, panel discussion, and “Zero Waste” French buffet reception

Dr. Janet Beizer, C. Douglas Dillon Professor of the Civilization of France at Harvard University, will deliver a public lecture and act as a film discussant on the literature, history, and culture of leftover food, the topic of her current book project. Her research on eating practices in nineteenth-century Paris, and in particular on the re-selling of rich people’s leftovers to the poor, brings together urban history and the socioeconomics of food in fascinating ways that are relevant to contemporary questions of food insecurity. Her lecture will be followed by a Zero Waste buffet and panel discussion with Dr. Robert W. Kahle, Joseph P. Riley, Jr. Center for Livable Communities at the College of Charleston, Margaret Grant, CofC Alumna and Director of Food Strategy at the Lowcountry Food Bank, and Mike Darrow, Executive Director of Feeding the Carolinas, the umbrella organization for North and South Carolina food banks which collect surplus and potentially throwaway food to nourish underserved and homeless populations.

The March 28 event benefits from grant support awarded by SC Humanities and the Sustainability Literacy Institute at the College of Charleston. The event is co-sponsored by the Department of French, Francophone and Italian Studies, the Office of Sustainability at the College of Charleston, and the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs.

Film screening of Agnès Varda’s The Gleaners and I
Friday, March 29, 3:00p.m., ECTR 118 (Education Center on St. Philip at Liberty St)

On the second day of her visit, Dr. Beizer will lead an informal discussion with Dr. Lauren Ravalico (Assistant Professor of French) following the public screening of Agnès Varda’s film The Gleaners and I, which is a French documentary (with English subtitles) about modern practices of gleaning, or collecting various sorts of leftovers.

 

April 2019
Refugee Life / Refuge of Food: Syrian Culture in the Wake of Wartime Diaspora
What is it like to be uprooted from one’s home and forced to restart a life far away from one’s family, friends, language, religion, culture, and land? How can a return to one’s traditional cooking and eating practices work to bond at least some of the wounds of war and diaspora?

Professors Vivian Appler (Theatre and Dance) and Lauren Ravalico (French) have organized a series of events to better understand these thorny political and cultural questions at heart of contemporary global foodways. The series takes as its starting point Amir Nizar Zuabi’s Off-Broadway play, Oh My Sweet Land: A Love Story from Syria. The play is a one-woman show about Syria, migration, compassion, and of course, food. Typically staged in home and community kitchens, the actress-narrator prepares a traditional Syrian dish of kibbeh as she embodies the many characters she encounters in her quest to record the traces of a disappearing country.

Thursday, April 4, 1:40-3:00p.m, Bob Waggoner Kitchen (164 Market St., 1 block from campus)
Dr. Appler’s Feminist Theatre course will  present a showcase of student-created performance intervention projects and dramaturgical presentations inspired by Oh My Sweet Land.

 

Friday April 5, 5:00p.m., Culinary Institute of Charleston Amphitheatre (Trident Technical College Palmer Campus downtown, 66 Columbus St, 29403); there is a parking lot with ample parking

In an exciting development, several Syrian refugees are coming to Charleston to complement the student showcase with cooking demonstrations, tasting experiences, poetry readings, and to join the university and greater Charleston community in conversation about their lives, their tastes, and their memories. Among them, Mayada Anjari, a Syrian home cook (from Homs) who has been featured in the New York Times and has published her first cookbook, The Bread and Salt Between Us. Shadi Martini,

Director of Humanitarian Relief and Regional Relations at the Multifaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees will discuss his work and his deep connection to the foods of Aleppo. Arabic-language poet Osama Alomar, originally from Damascus, and currently an Exiled Writer-In-Residence at City of Asylum in Pittsburgh, will also be joining us to share his writing and thoughts. Dr. Shayna Silverstein, Assistant Professor of Performance Studies at Northwestern University will round out the panel with a presentation on Syrian dance and the tradition of embodied expression.
The evening will include special guest Nathalie Dupree, Charleston’s Culinary Ambassador.

*There will be a limited number of copies of Anjari’s cookbook and Alomar’s poetry for signing and sale after the event.

*FREE TICKET REQUIRED TO ATTEND EVENT*

My Food Is My Flag: A Conversation about Jewish, African American, and Southern Foodways
Tuesday, April 9, 2019, 7:00p.m.
Simmons Center Recital Hall

While food may seem simple, what people eat is shaped not only by geography and the environment, but also by culture, religion, and the interaction of different groups over time. Join food historian Marcie Cohen Ferris and James Beard Award–winning chef and author Michael Twitty for a conversation about two communities that have been cooking and eating in the South from the colonial period to the present day: Jews and African Americans. Drawing on their influential books, Matzo Ball Gumbo: Culinary Tales of the Jewish South and The Cooking Gene: A Journey through African American Culinary History in the Old South, Ferris and Twitty will reflect on how foodways can illuminate our understanding of the region and its people.
This event is sponsored by the Yaschik/Arnold Jewish Studies Program. Contact Dr. Shari Rabin for more information (rabinsl@cofc.edu).

Chocolate Grand Finale!

Thursday April 11, 4:30p.m., RITA 101 (Rita Liddy Hollings Science Center)
Public lecture + multi-course chocolate tasting

Dr. Carla Martin, Founder and Executive Director of the Fine Cacao and Chocolate Institute (FCCI) and Lecturer in the Department of African and African American Studies at Harvard University on the Global History of Chocolate. Her visit will coincide with a “beans to bar” lesson and chocolate tasting session with local sustainable chocolatier Bethany Nunn.

This event benefits from grant support from SC Humanities and is co-sponsored by the African American Studies Program, the Department of Anthropology and Sociology, the Department of French, Francophone and Italian Studies, the Environmental and Sustainability Studies Program, and the Office of Sustainability.

Friday April 12, 5:00p.m., ECTR 118 (Education Center on St. Philip at Liberty St)
Enjoy watching and discussing Spanish-language film (from Mexico), Like Water for Chocolate (Como Agua para Chocolate) with Hispanic Studies faculty members Mary Ann Blitt and Silvia Rodríguez Sabater. This screening coincides with the final day of the campus-wide Sustainability Week. After the film there will be a Global Food Fair at which to   try Mexican chocolate and other Mexican foods.

Encore!: The Spirited Brunch
A self-guided spiritual and edible tour of downtown congregations is tentatively planned for Sunday, April 28. The event is co-sponsored by the Department of Religious Studies, the Post & Courier, and the Charleston Inter-religious Council.

There will also be a year long film series with discussions and food: