Panel 1 – Technology Meets Nature

Each of these papers presents a different kind of technological intervention in the workings and reworkings of natural elements and/or natural processes; they address the various fields of soil, cuisine,…

Panel 2 – Interdependencies: Human and Nature

These papers address the ways in which humans work with natural elements, understood as ranging from earth, air, water, and fire; to shifting climate and weather conditions; to evolving agricultural…

Panel 3 – Where There’s Smoke. . .

This session's papers explore the elemental role of fire (whether by direct flame heat, or smoking) in cooking food or preparing alimentary products, globally and historically. In focii ranging from…

Panel 4 – Bitter/Sour

The papers in this panel focus on two of the five generally accepted elements of taste: sour and bitter, in traditional Persian and Jewish cooking, respectively. Their fields of exploration…

Panel 5 – A Few Grains of Salt

This session is about water- and plant-based salts, focusing respectively on Spanish, Nigerian, and Indian harvests and uses. Papers will explore practical and cultural associations of women and sea-harvested salt,…

Panel 6 – Transmissions and Transformations

The papers in this session share a focus on the communication and transmission of knowledge and beliefs about cooking, nutrition, and How can ostensible information be modified and transformed by…

Panel 7 – What’s Love Got to Do with It?

Together these papers ask what is being transmitted – besides nutrients – in the act of feeding and eating. What are the affective elements of food production, distribution, and dining?…

Panel 9 – By Land or By Sea: Remapping the Elements

These papers address the management and manipulation of elemental conditions affecting sea travel, farming the land, and facing changing environmental conditions. How can technology and other forms of knowledge implementation…

Panel 10 – Revisiting the Periodic Table

The elements of the periodic table have inspired research, science, myths, and speculations. These papers will take us through some of these, exploring medical uses, nutritional exploitations, socio-cultural connotations, and…

Panel 11 – Animal/Edible

This panel looks at cultural and theological concepts of the elements as they relate to, morph into, and are structured by social structuring of edibiity. Animals, humans, and deities eat…

Panel 12 – The Stakes of Water

Heat and the need for water and ice have affected the ecosystem, everyday life, and culinary practices. This panel will address water and ice in their effects on social organization,…