Oral History Essay

Directions:

Interview someone over the age of fifty about their food-related memories. Here are some questions to get you started:

• Are there any foods that trigger memories of your childhood?
• Do you have any memories of first tasting some kind of food or drink?
• How does food relate to your sense of cultural identity and/or gender?

Your finished essay should be 850-1000 words (2-3 pages, double-spaced, 12-point font).

Note: This is not a free-form response piece, but a short analytical essay. You need to present an argument about how food relates to your interview subject’s identity, and supply evidence from the interview to support your argument. You may also tell the person’s stories but you need to integrate the stories (or narrative) into an argument, which is one of the critical challenges of history writing.

You should set up the historical context for your interviewee in the first paragraph. For example, if you are interviewing a neighbor and his first food-related memories are about rationing during World War II, you’d want to explain briefly why food was rationed during the war and the effect this had on your subject. How did this shape the person he became? My grandfather once told me that when his mother found out he was eating meat she told him she wished he had never been born – a very painful experience for him but one that highlighted his belief (and bourgeoning identity) that “real” men needed to eat meat, even if they were raised by vegetarians.

Overall, you need to link your interviewee’s food memories with some aspect of their identity and discuss this within the broader historical setting. This argument – the link between the food memories and identity – will be your “thesis.”

Please let me know if you have any further questions!

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