ABSTRACT
This chapter concerns the introducing ways in which food studies can be taught in a linguistic anthropology framework. In particular, it focuses on teaching methods for a traditional freshman-level linguistic anthropology course called Culture and Communication. It introduces a perspective that depicts food as one system of para-linguistic communication that allows people to manipulate their identity and create groups, or food communities that define boundaries of interaction and acceptance. By outlining terms from linguistic anthropology and concepts of interest to all anthropologists, the goal of this course is to illuminate how many of these 'natural' groupings are rooted in ethnocentrism, racism, or sexism. While the field of study began with the constraints of structuralism, it has expanded into an incredibly diverse realm of research. Some of this research has brought the study of food ways away from its structural linguistics roots in order to expand into the cross-disciplinary needs of the topic.
