New Culinary Landscapes in Turkey and the Levant: Global Perspectives - In-person
When:
—
Venue:
Birkbeck Central
Room BCB 307 in Birkbeck Central, University of London, Malet St, London WC1E 7HY
Please note this event is also taking place online - see here
The culinary landscape within Turkey and neighbouring countries of the Levant has been radically transformed over the past few decades. Regional food traditions have been recovered and reinvented both at home and abroad, while an ostensibly national drink like raki has itself been subject to ‘artisanal’ innovations or rebranded in relation to local denominations of origin. Much the same can be said about wine production in the eastern Mediterranean more widely, as neglected grape varieties, old vineyards and new wine-making techniques and procedures (including organic, natural and low-intervention wines) are rescued and revalorised. All of this has happened in an international context where Turkish and Levantine foodways are combined, marketed to a global audience, and delivered through a transnational political economy.
We seek in this one-day symposium to understand and evaluate the nature and driving forces of this changing gastronomic landscape through concepts drawn from the academic disciplines of politics, economics, sociology, anthropology, geography and area studies.
Programme
(the event will be held in-person and online participation will be facilitated through a link sent to registered participants closer to the time)
10.30-12.00: Changing Culinary Landscapes of Turkey and the Levant
Chair: Alex Colás (Birkbeck, University of London)
Ismail Ertürk (Manchester University): Values and Valuations of Culinary World in present-day Turkey (in the Age of Gastronomy Revolution)
Derya Nizam Bilgiç (Izmir Economy University): Geographic Indicators and Socio-Economy of Food Production in Turkey
Candan Turkan (Ozyegin University, Istanbul) Personal is Political – and Profitable! Neo-Farmers and Food Activism in the Age of Social Media
12.00-13.30: Traditions and innovations of Alcohol Drinks and Drinking in Turkey and the Levant
Chair: Jason Edwards (Birkbeck, University of London)
Daniel Monterescu (Central European University, Vienna) and Ariel Handel (Bezalel, Jerusalem): The Indigenous Turn: Authenticity and Autochthony in Israeli and Palestinian Wine Worlds
Atak Ayaz (Geneva Graduate Institute, IHEID): Wine and Wine Routes in Turkey
Tan Morgul (Independent researcher/writer, London): New Turkish Taverns and Raki Scenes
15.00-16.30: Appropriations and Exchanges in Transnational Culinary Landscapes of Turkey and the Levant
Chair: Claudia Prieto-Piastro (King's College London)
Joel Hart (independent researcher/writer, London): On Pomegratuity -The Mediterranean and the Levant in the British Culinary Imagination since Ottolenghi
Ronald Ranta (Kingston University, London):
Decolonising Israeli Food? Between Culinary Appropriation and Recognition in Israel/Palestine
Contact name:
Alex Colas