From Flint Knives to Cloned Meat:

Our Ambiguous Love, Hate, and
Fear of Food Technologies

The 2014 Roger Smith Conference on Food Call For Proposals

This year’s Roger Smith Conference on Food will focus on the interrelationships of food, technology, and culture. The story of food technologies through the ages is one of constant change in every aspect of producing, processing, cooking, and talking about the things people eat. By “food technologies” we mean any imaginable means of using and manipulating food, from cracking nuts with a rock to molecular gastronomy. Indeed, the very act of deciding what is or isn’t food is intrinsically bound up with technology. We look forward to interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches examining the flow of influences from food technologies to our culture and environment, and vice versa. We hope to discuss agriculture, cooking paraphernalia, factory-scale manufacturing, artisanal production, and communications (from traditional cookbooks to the internet, apps, and all the brave new world that is now becoming old hat). Anything within this very broad framework is fair game.

We invite scholarly papers suitable for publication and more informal presentations, as well as workshops and demonstrations. We hope to see proposals on food production, processing, storage, and distribution as well as culinary practices. The conference will include historical research, contemporary cultural commentary, and prognostications about the future of food. Our goal is a diverse, stimulating exchange of ideas.

For guidance in submitting proposals, we are suggesting some topics and questions that may be addressed within those topics, but other ideas undoubtedly will occur to people and are most welcome.

Cancellation Policy: No refunds or cancellations under any circumstances.