Rethinking Chicana/o Literature through Food

Meredith E. Abarca, University of Texas, El Paso, USAPaul Allatson, University of Technology, Sydney, AustraliaLaura P. Alonso Gallo, Barry University, Miami, USASuzanne Bost, Loyola University, Chicago, USANorma E. Cantú, University of Missouri-Kansas City, USANorma L. Cárdenas, Oregon State University, USAElizabeth Lee Steere, University of West Georgia, USAMimi Reisel Gladstein, University of Texas, El Paso, USANieves Pascual, University of Jaén, SpainHeather Salter, Northwestern State University of Louisiana, USAEdith Vásquez, Pitzer College, USA Irene Vásquez, University of New Mexico, USA

"Editors Nieves Pascual Soler and Meredith E. Abarca offer in their collection, Rethinking Chicana/o Literature through Food: Postnational Appetites, a cornucopia of exceptional essays that apply their newly constructed theoretical paradigm based on food and food consciousness in the analysis and hermeneutics of Chicano/a literary production. The authors brilliantly posit that food preparation and consumption extant in literary discourse is a vehicle of communication encoding various acts of rebellion against marginalization and exclusion in a patriarchal nation. Foodways, Soler and Abarca splendidly and provocatively assert, provide a means of 'redefining subjectivities in postnational cultures.' This is a must-read scholarly work for those interested in the construction of national and postnational subjectivities." - Maria Herrera-Sobek, Associate Vice Chancellor, Professor of Chicana/o Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA "Covering a diverse range of writers and texts, this collection is a valuable contribution to food studies and literary scholarship that has overlooked the presence of food and consumption in Chicana/o writing. Abarca and Pascual Soler provide a much-needed study on how food in Chicana/o literature creates and represents consciousness/concientizacion, thus shifting the Anzalduan border paradigm from an 'open wound' to an 'open mouth.' A study like this was long overdue." - Cristina Herrera, Associate Professor of Chicano and Latin American Studies, California State University, Fresno, USA

• PART I: TRANSLATABLE FOODS 1. Diabetes, Culture, and Food: Posthumanist Nutrition in the Gloria Anzaldúa Archive; Suzanne Bost 2. Bologna Tacos and Kitchen Slaves: Food and Identity in Sandra Cisneros's Caramelo; Heather Salter 3. Food Journeys in Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation and Woman Hollering Creek; Norma L. Cárdenas PART II: THE TASTE OF AUTHENTICITY 4. 'Because Feeding is the Beginning and End': Food Politics in Ana Castillo's So Far From God; Elizabeth Lee Steere 5. Food, Consciousness and Feminism in Denise Chávez's Loving Pedro Infante; Laura P. Alonso Gallo PART III: THE VOICE OF HUNGER 6. Families Who Eat Together, Stay Together: But Should They?'; Meredith E. Abarca 7. La Comida y La Conciencia: Foods in the Counter-Poetics of Lorna Dee Cervantes; Edith Vásquez, University of California, Riverside, & Irene Vásquez 8. Hungers and Desires: Borderlands Appetites; Norma E. Cantú PART IV: MACHOS OR COOKS 9. Chicano Culinarius: From Cowboys to Gastronomers; Nieves Pascual 10. Mexican Meat Matzah Balls: Burciaga as a Culinary Ambassador; Mimi Reisel Gladstein 11. Reading the Taco Shop Poets in the Crossroads of Chicano Postnationalism; Paul Allatson