This is an abstract for a panel for the AAA 2017 meetings in DC. Click here to see the CFP for the conference from SAFN and here for more details on the conference. Contact information and deadlines for this proposal are below.
Building the Big Tent: Anthropology and Interdisciplinary Work in Food and Nutrition
Systems thinking and interdisciplinary work are essential to facing challenges in contemporary food environments that are complex and globalized. Issues such as the nutrition transition and sustainable food systems are difficult to comprehend or address using a single lens or discipline. National initiatives such as Healthy People 2020, and international efforts by the World Health Organization urge greater scrutiny of the social determinants of health to target health conditions, like chronic disease, that have a long chain of causality. These are often rooted in historic trends such as colonization, urbanization, and globalization, with deep political and cultural implications. Biomedical or socio-cultural approaches prove inadequate on their own to establishing lasting solutions. Integrative research in nutrition uses systems thinking to connect research about human nutrition and the experience of food across biological, socio-cultural, economic, and political dimensions. Transdisciplinary and integrative research that transcend the politics of siloed academic research and scholarship and build the big tent are critical to crafting effective responses to intractable global health and nutrition issues.
Despite academic recognition of the importance of interdisciplinary work, there is limited scholarship and deliberation about best practices. Even while interdisciplinary programs emerge, there is little discourse on how to include such approaches within courses, across curricula, and in institutions. There is a need for more research and sharing of best practices in interdisciplinary work and integrative research that help us move forward. This session will focus on the process and nature of interdisciplinary work and integrative approaches to research in community food and nutrition. We encourage submissions that address, but are not limited to, any of the following:
- The role of anthropology in interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, and/or inter-professional work in community food and nutrition
- Models of ecological and systems thinking, including best practices and methods using integrative research approaches
- Stories of difficulties faced and lessons learned: bridging distances, developing common language and culture
- Examples of emerging projects and questions posed
- Reflections on being an interdisciplinary scholar
- Developing courses and curriculum in higher education settings
- Using transdisciplinary platforms to inform and influence policies, programs, and interventions
Please submit a title and 250 word abstract by March 28, 2017 to Kimberly E. Johnson (kjohnson4@wcupa.edu ) and Susan Johnston (Sjohnston@wcupa.edu).
FoodAnthropology 