The tasting table: Food as theme and instigator of creative and practical projects

Abstract or Summary

Food is a signifier of culture, generation, and social status. Each recipe is a narrative and each dish arising from a recipe an exploration of the word made flesh (or textured vegetable protein or aquafaba!). Building on the centrality and redundancy of food in our lives, three panelists who are teachers and researchers discuss how we have chosen to use food themes, developing our own and our student's communication and creative practice. Having shared our mahi with each other, we share techniques, synergies, reflections, and a tasting table of stimuli. Elna Fourie is a Senior Academic Staff Member at the School of Media Arts, and a facilitator and coach at Design Factory New Zealand (DFNZ). Discussing recent student projects from DFNZ, she brings to the panel reflections on the potential of food-based projects to allow for multi-disciplinary engagement, for student-community collaboration, and for applying human-centred design approaches to solving societal challenges. Gail Pittaway is a Principal Academic Staff Member in the School of Media Arts and a teacher of Writing, Storytelling and Creative Media. Currently a PhD candidate at the Central Queensland University in Creative Writing, she is writing a Creative Nonfictional food memoir. She will discuss the use of food as stimulus for students’ writing and how investigation into food writing and food practices have generated a portfolio of articles and chapters for her own research. Cate Prestidge is a Principal Academic Staff Member in the School of Media Arts, teaching media, communication and professional practice. Her masters study included examining the value of applied learning and the ‘soft skills’ required for graduates to thrive in the creative industries. Cate will discuss the ways food has featured in recent student learning, including; breaking down barriers for diversity interviews and the challenges of managing a test kitchen.