Food Anthro for Middle Schoolers: All About Bread

Ariana Gunderson
Indiana University

I recently had the opportunity to share the importance and joys of our discipline of Food Anthropology with sixteen middle schoolers who visited Indiana University’s campus. In developing a food anthropology workshop on the subject of bread for these tweens, I benefitted greatly from the collective wisdom of SAFN members, who shared their own experiences of teaching food anthro to kiddos in a recent blog post. Here, I’ll share the lesson plan and script from my workshop, where we spent one hour together analyzing bread’s context, using our senses, and good notetaking.

In this workshop, I gave a brief introduction to food anthropology, which I framed for the students as studying the huge variety of food and food practice around the world. I explained that I focus less on the nutritive aspects of food, and more on its social cultural work – why do people eat this food, and what does it mean for them?

We brainstormed all the different kinds of bread we could think of, and I wrote them on the board. We talked about how these breads taste different from one another, and how they have different contexts. For this workshop, I defined context as the where and when of a food.

The heart of the lesson was when the students got to practice being food anthropologists themselves, working with three examples of bread: corn tortillas, matzoh, and hot dog buns. Working in small groups and taking good notes in their notebooks (I gave each student a little notebook as a souvenir), the students first analyzed their bread sample using their five senses. Then I provided them with the packages the bread came in, and they wrote notes and discussed the contexts they knew or could imagine for their bread sample. Then, we rotated groups and they went through the same analyses (first sensory, then context) for a second, and then a third kind of bread. We concluded the lesson by discussing as a whole class the context (or the where and when) for each bread.

Below you’ll find my ‘script’ for the lesson. I wrote it as a narrative but in the workshop, took many liberties and spoke off the cuff as well. 

Hi! I’m Ariana. I’m a Food Anthropologist.

You might have never heard of a food anthropologist before, but today you all will get to try out being a food anthropologist yourselves!

So you probably already know that food is different in different places. The way people have breakfast, lunch, and dinner is different in Madrid, Beijing, Mexico City, and Indianapolis. Food anthropologists look at allllll that variety and difference and pay very close attention to what people eat and WHY. We use all our senses to pay attention to the food and the people eating it, we take really detailed notes, and we learn about the foods that people eat and what those foods mean.

Because food is a LOT more than just nourishment for our physical bodies. Food is also important for our emotions, and our connections to our friends and families.

Think about a birthday cake. Yes, there are calories and sugar and carbohydrates that you are consuming, that your body turns into energy so you can run around at the party. But the cake is also a special ritual. What happens at a birthday party when the cake is brought out?

• People sing happy birthday!
• They light and blow out the candles
• The birthday kid makes a wish
• Everyone gets a slice and eats together.

It might not feel like a real birthday without a birthday cake, right? That’s because the food is an important part of the event – it’s a big part of what makes the birthday kid feel special, and makes it feel like a party that EVERYONE is celebrating together about the birthday kid.

Any questions?

Food anthropologists look for moments like this in every kind of meal all around the world. And today, you’re going to be food anthropologists of BREAD!!!

You’ve already started learning about how bread it made in this class, but you’ve also got a lifetime of experience in EATING and being around food. This is important because as anthropologists, our bodies are the instrument, so we work hard to cultivate our perceptive and sensory abilities and take very good notes. Our experiences are the research – so you have all be doing research already, your whole lives! You probably already know SO much about the anthropology of bread without even knowing it. But today we’re going to think about it all together!

We’ll start by brainstorming together. What are all the different kinds of bread we can think of? Let’s define bread REALLY broadly. [write on the board]

[Prompt:

• Sourdough
• Wonderbread
• Sandwich bread
• Whole wheat bread
• Naan
• Roti
• Lavash
• Focaccia
• Breadsticks
• Tortillas
• Injera
• Flatbread
• Pizza
• Rolls
• Bagels
• Rye bread
• Crackers
• Matzoh
• Hamburger and Hotdog Buns
• Cinnamon rolls
• Quickbread]

These are all bread right? But they come from different places, and you eat them in different CONTEXTS. Context is very important for anthropologists. Do you know what context means? [prompt: It’s the time and place and environment surrounding something.] Foods can be associated with particular times and places, but foods also move around. Humans have been on the move for as long as we have been on this earth, and when humans move somewhere, they bring their food with them! So those contexts change over time. Naan has an association with India, right? But I’ve had and made naan, even though I’ve never been to India! The naan has moved along with people, and naan is a part of our context here in Indiana too. The meanings and practice are different in different places, changing as the food moves around.

Let’s think through an example together.

What is a typical context for bagels? [prompt: breakfast, New York, Jewish population].

What is a typical context for Breadsticks? [prompt: Italian restaurant, dinner, Olive garden, a snack before a larger meal]

Do bagels and breadsticks taste the same? No! Would you have breadsticks at the same time and place you would have bagels? No! So we will think through those differences together in an experiment right now.

Any questions at this point?

Okay I’m going to hand out to each of you the anthropologist’s most important tool: a NOTEBOOK. When you get your notebook, write your name on it right away. [hand out notebooks]

We’ll break up into groups of 6, and each group will get one kind of bread. We will start by slowing down and really paying attention to our senses with these breads. What are the five senses? These are all interconnected, right? When you go see a movie, you watch the screen, hear the sound, feel your chair shake, and you might even be eating popcorn! Our experience integrates all of these senses, but it can be helpful to focus on one at a time when we’re really trying to pay attention.

Great. So here are the breads. [Hand out breads – one for each group of Matzoh, Hotdog Buns, and Corn Tortillas] With your group, think about the answers to these questions and write the answers in your notebook. How do you describe these breads with your five senses? Write it allllll down! You need your notebook if you’re an anthropologist.

• What does your bread LOOK like? What is the color, the shape? Describe it in your notebook!
• What does your bread SOUND like? If you squish it, or brush your fingers on it, or fold it in half?
• What does your bread FEEL like? What is the texture of the outside, the inside?
• What does your bread SMELL like? Hold it up close to your nose and sniff. What does it smell like? Try to think of words other than ‘bready’! [prompt – plasticky, browned from baking, does the smell remind you of a place or time?]
• What does your bread TASTE like? Take a bite and chew it really slowly!!!!!! Hold it in your mouth for a while, roll it around on your tongue to get it on all your tastebuds.

Great! So we’ve spent time thinking about the sensory experience of the bread, and we’ve got great notes written down. Next we’re going to think about the CONTEXT of the bread.

Working with your group, write down in your notebook as many things you know, or guess, or wonder about your bread. You can answer these questions based on your own experience with this kind of bread. If you aren’t familiar with this bread, then use your anthropological skills of paying attention, and try to answer the questions based on the packaging it came in, or based on what you’ve heard about this bread or seen in movies or TV. Anthropologists often encounter foods and practices that are unfamiliar, and it’s important that we approach them with a spirit of curiosity and respect. Just because something isn’t to your taste, doesn’t mean that everyone agrees. It’s important as a food anthropologist to above all be polite and respectful about other people’s food. We don’t want to be rude, we want to learn!

• What is your bread called?
• WHERE would you eat it? Is there a kind of restaurant or place in the world that you think of this bread being most often?
• WHEN would you eat it? Is there a time of day or year when you would eat it?
• What foods does this bread go well with?
• What foods or contexts does this bread NOT go well with? Is there a time or place that this bread wouldn’t fit?

[Groups rotate through so all get to do the sensory and context analysis on all of the samples]

[End of Script]

            This workshop went well, and the one-hour time slot was adequate to rotate three groups through each of the bread samples, with a few minutes for Q&A at the end. I look forward to returning to this workshop, perhaps as a way to celebrate Anthropology Day next February. Bread worked well as a central foodstuff, and I was glad I selected at least one gluten-free option to keep the workshop accessible. If you have ideas for other foodstuffs to try such a workshop with, or different views for how one might represent the field of food anthropology to K-12 students, I hope you will share them in the comments!