Colleen McDonald is used to getting blank stares, puzzled responses and what-are-you-going-to-do-with-that? questions—even from literary arts and philosophy concentrators—when she tells people what she’s majoring in. But more often people are intrigued, because McDonald, a sophomore, is exploring something undeniably interesting—the role of food in shaping culture—even if it means pursuing a major that doesn’t exist. She’s planning on independently concentrating in gastroanthropology—a social science that considers culture through the lens of food.
“It’s anthropology, but much more focused on this specific substance, so it’s going to a look a bit more interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary than straight anthropology,” she says.
McDonald first became interested in the social science of food through a summer program at Yale that she attended during high school. One of the classes she took there was food anthropology, which exposed her to a significant body of scholarly food literature.
“I realized there is a substantial amount of research in this area, and also a substantial amount of significance that’s not explored, possibly because of people’s preconceived notions of the domain of food,” she said. “It’s something that we take for granted, and it’s something that’s usually been in the domain of woman. So people think, ‘What role does that play?’—when, in reality, it’s something that’s shaped the formation of societies and cultures.”
At the moment, McDonald plans to take between ten and 13 classes for her concentration, including Nutrition, Diet and Chronic Disease, Food and Drink in Classical Antiquity, and a GISP about eating disorders. She hopes to take courses that tie into gastroanthropology from departments as varied as archaeology, biology and English, but she plans to ground her concentration in anthropology.
“The reason I’m looking at anthropology to get the research background is that I think it’s important to leave undergraduate education with a strong skill set as well as very honed interests,” she explains. “I want to leave knowing a lot about food and having the skills to approach that in a way that is meaningful and also marketable.”
McDonald isn’t the only Brown student with a scholarly interest in food. Emma Buck, a junior, is also a concentrator in gastroanthropology, but her concentration focuses more on agriculture, whereas McDonald’s interests lie more in nutrition and psychology.
Buck, who works as an independent concentration advisor, says she’s seen a rise in the number of Brown students who are looking to delve into the study of food.
“There are two freshmen that I know of that have come to info sessions wanting to learn more about making their own concentrations having to do with food, and another who wanted to be a food critic,” she says.
McDonald hasn’t yet received approval for her concentration from the College Curriculum Council, but she’s confident that she’ll be approved, mostly because her academic plan is similar to Buck’s, which was accepted last year.
But she’s nervous that she won’t find a suitable advisor for her concentration; she’s reached out to several professors, but has yet to find one whose interests are similar to her own. She’s also understandably concerned about how her concentration might limit her career choices after graduation.
“A lot of people will get an English or a history degree in university and then go apply for a job somewhere else, and that works out great,” she says. “But if someone has gastroanthropology as a concentration and then goes and applies for a job not exactly in that field, is that going to look like a bigger discrepancy?”
McDonald isn’t sure yet about her post-graduation plans, but, for now, she’ll continue to study food at Brown, through either an independent concentration, or, if that doesn’t work out, as part of an anthropology concentration.