Video & Podcasts - ENGL 1711 - Composition: Food & Thought - Taylor

Using Videos & Podcasts

Unless your assignment specifically permits or prohibits it, you'll want to check with your instructor before using a video or a podcast as a source for your work.

Once you've got the "go ahead," check out some of the options below, or find your own online!

To search for podcasts, you've got plenty of choices: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, etc. You can search by keyword on your chosen platform.

To search for relevant videos, you may want to start with the library catalog--the library has access to thousands of streaming videos through Films on Demand. To find them, you'll use the catalog search box below.

To perform a basic search:
Step 1. Enter your keywords and click "Search"
Step 2. On the left hand side of your results page, click "Resource Type" and then "Videos"
Step 3. When prompted, sign in using your StarID and password.

Streaming Video

Does It Matter How Our Food Is Produced?
While high-tech agriculture is one of the hallmarks of Western society, a growing number of Americans and Europeans believe that our farming methods are harmful on a number of levels. This program looks at the evolving debate over industrialized food production versus organic farming. Showing how and why farming techniques and policies have changed in the U.K. and similar countries over the last 50 years, the film then examines modern pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, polytunnels, and biodomes, and discusses how intensive farming stacks up against organic and free-range farming. Perspectives from growers, food retailers, consumers, and agriculture experts are featured.
Enjoy Your Meal! How Food Changes the World
Exploring the aisles of a Dutch grocery store, this program clearly demonstrates that globalization has made almost any food item, no matter how exotic or remote, available to the Western consumer. But the film also shows the downside of that new global access, tracing specific foods to their countries of origin and revealing the impact on indigenous communities and ecosystems. Viewers witness the burning of Mehinaku forestland in Brazil in order to cultivate soya crops; the creation of inland shrimp farms in the Philippines at the expense of fragile mangrove habitats; and the mass production of sugar peas, green beans, and other vegetables-made possible by low-wage Kenyan labor. A powerful visual study that is sure to spark further discussions of food security and sustainability.
A Feast Of African-American Culinary Contributions, Baked Into The South's DNA
In chef and culinary historian Michael Twitty's new book, ancestry—both his own and that of Southern food—is a central theme. With The Cooking Gene: A Journey through African-American Culinary History in the Old South, Twitty addresses the complicated story of race, culture, and food and its legacy today. Jeffrey Brown talks with Twitty about his mission in writing this book.
History of American Cuisine
This video explores America’s rich culinary heritage and looks at the many types of foods that Americans eat. Beginning with recipes that developed when Native American and colonial European cultures met, the program describes the cookery of the New England coast, Deep South, Midwest, Southwest, and Pacific Coast. The dazzling variety of styles that have shaped American cuisine—including African, Chinese, and other influences—are described in detail, along with uniquely American inventions such as fast food. The program concludes with the ultimate American cooking style: California’s fusion cuisine.
Taboo: Delicacies
Our tastes reveal who we are—and who we aren’t. This program injects a perspective-changing awareness into conventional views of food, searching the globe for culinary traditions that disgust some and delight others. From rotten shark meat in Iceland to a goat fetus in India, from cooked rat in Togo to a stew made from bull genitals in Taiwan, the video showcases numerous unusual delicacies. It also reminds us that while mainstream, Anglo-American culture takes a dim view of dietary customs beyond its horizons, that kind of squeamishness can be a two-way street. A National Geographic Production.

Podcasts

Bad Table Manners
When it comes to South Asian food, there is a social hierarchy that qualifies certain dishes into “high” and “low” food culture–it’s a paradigm that shouldn’t exist. On Whetstone Magazine’s Bad Table Manners, Delhi-based anthropologist Meher Varma uses narrative storytelling to invite us into an intimate look at micro contexts of homey households, beloved restaurants, bustling streets and neighborhoods, and vibrant communities in South India. You’ll also learn about how global gastronomic trends are changing the food scene there.
The Food That Built America
From The History Channel, The Food That Built America tells the untold stories of American foods, viewed through a historical lens: how an ambitious salesman created a fast food empire, how TGIFridays went from a singles’ club to a family establishment, and the parallel rise of Pizza Hut and Dominoes. With a focus on the colorful characters with strange inventions that took off, quirky food combos that struck a chord with Americans, and cultural moments that created a perfect storm for a brand, restaurant, or recipe to go big, it’s a show for anyone who’s ever eaten.
Gastropod
Gastropod tells stories about food through the lens of history and science. Every other week, co-hosts Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley present surprising facts and tales about everything from why ketchup is so thick to the almost unbelievable story of how we started eating eel. Each episode is an experience full of interviews, lab and file visits, and even archaeological digs. Cynthia and Nicola are having fun mining the food history books to help us better understand the world.
The Sporkful
Dan Pashman’s show “for eaters, not foodies.” Dan covers food from outside the recipe box: issues food causes in relationships; religious, racial, and cultural issues in the food space, food etiquette, interviews with people doing interesting things in the space, and more.

ENGL 1711 - Composition: Food & Thought - Taylor: Video & Podcasts

Using Videos & Podcasts

Unless your assignment specifically permits or prohibits it, you'll want to check with your instructor before using a video or a podcast as a source for your work.

Streaming Video

Podcasts