As part of the Cluster Pedagogy Learning Community (CPLC) at my institution, I’ve been reading about various strategies for improving teaching and learning. I came to this task hungry for knowledge and insight, but I also began to crave more literal forms of sustenance when I encountered a cornucopia of food metaphors in the assigned articles. In addition to giving clarity to abstract pedagogical concepts by relating them to familiar foods, the abundance of nutritional imagery in these posts signals the nourishing, essential functions of education — particularly during the current pandemic.
Matt Cheney’s video on “Interdisciplinarity” in Higher Education compares the concept to a smoothie: the distinct flavors of different fruits and vegetables – metaphors for academic fields – are blended into something completely new and distinct. In this analogy, disciplines are individual fruits and multidisciplinarity is a fruit salad, in which disciplines are mingled rather than merged.
My stomach and mind started to growl even more when Cathie LeBlanc used figurative food imagery in her own video, “Intro to Project-Based Learning.” She explains that in project-oriented learning, students are taught a lesson – the meal – then asked to do a project afterward as the “dessert” course. But in project-based learning, the project is the meal itself. Yum!
Then I turned to Abby Goode’s “Slow Interdisciplinarity,” which uses food as subject rather than metaphor. Using her “American Food Issues” seminar as a case study, she argues that interdisciplinary takes time. Her perspective resonates strongly with me and is worth quoting at length:
“In our frenzy to be interdisciplinary, we are often quick to label our work and our courses as such, without putting pressure on the implicit knowledge divides and hierarchies that govern intellectual life, without recognizing the vital role that students play in rendering a learning experience interdisciplinary…This fast, frantic version of interdisciplinarity is counterproductive, and it threatens to further destabilize the shifting landscape of higher education.
…What would it look like to apply “slowness” to interdisciplinary pedagogies? As a method of teaching and learning, “slow interdisciplinarity” calls us to be mindful, respectful, and curious about each other’s disciplinary perspectives—to value ways of knowing that might challenge and enhance our own. This “slowness” does not signify “inefficiency,” “smallness,” or “ineffectiveness.” It is not a plea for more time in developing urgently-needed, integrated curricula and pedagogies for the twenty-first century. And it is most certainly not an obstructionist effort to preserve higher education as it is. In fact, slow interdisciplinarity works against a form of hasty interdisciplinary mania in higher education that can often end up confusing learners and our institutional communities as a whole.”
Re-reading these words in the context of COVID-19, I was reminded of Episode 268 on Andy J. Miller’s podcast “Creative Pep Talk,” which was brought to my attention by my colleague Ashley Norman. The eponymous “pep” refers to pepperoni as well as motivation, and pizza is a recurring theme in the series. In this particular episode, though, Miller describes an anecdote from the early days of quarantine in which he slowed down, ditched the usual take-out, and crafted a delicious bowl of ramen complete with marinated soft-boiled egg, ginger, garlic, and sesame. “I just took some time making a meal,” he reflects. “We haven’t really put in the full effort and through the busyness of our schedules and the onslaught of things coming at us we just barely get by. You know, just stuff some veggies here, try to make sure it’s not all junk food. But it’s not really soul food; it’s not nourishing us in every possible way.”
He goes on to relate his “spiritual cleanse” of ramen to artistic inspiration, offering the theory “you art what you eat.” In other words, the quality of one’s own creations are directly informed by the sources of inspiration you consume, and by extension, the pace of this process. “As we’re in this isolation,” Miller continues, “what we can do is start digging into healthier inspiration…if all of the inspiration that you’re taking in right now is the fast-food / junk-food of social media — if that’s all you’re really consuming — that’s all you’re really going to be able to make .” Importantly, he cautions that inspiration “is not just about what’s trendy and cool right now from your peers”
As part of the CPLC, I’ve recently had the opportunity to consume high-quality resources on teaching and learning such as Cheney’s, LeBlanc’s, and Goode’s. Their perspectives — with some help from Miller’s — have helped me think through some of the discomfort I’m currently feeling about curricular innovation prior to and during the Coronavirus pandemic. Faculty do not develop curriculum in a vacuum, and right now we are working within a complex and precarious financial climate in which the ongoing existence of our jobs, disciplines, and even our institutions cannot be taken for granted. In this context, curriculum becomes problematically tied to questions of financial sustainability, job security, institutional promotion in ways that I fear may exacerbate the conditions of Goode’s “hasty interdisciplinary mania.”
"In-N-Out Burger" by Like_the_Grand_Canyon is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
I am concerned that the principles of interdisciplinarity, project-based learning, and open pedagogy are not inherently nourishing in and of themselves, but may be rushed and manipulated in response to these extracurricular financial and administrative imperatives. The resulting curriculum may be no more nourishing than the fast-food education we’re trying to avoid. For instance, the principles of the interdisciplinary smoothie can be used to make a decadent milkshake. We can serve a project as the main course, but what if it’s a cheeseburger? These are attractive foods in the moment, but will they sustain students long-term? As my CPLC cohort and I move forward creating new “Cluster Curricula” for our university, I hope we can all pay attention to the “prep time” and “baking time” and not just the ingredients of our respective recipes. Above all, I hope we can center the student experience existence and help them slow down, too.
Admittedly, both my literal and figurative consumption hasn’t exactly been nourishing during this quarantine. I’m definitely gaining what I call the “COVID-19” around my waistline, so why not follow in the Birkenstocked-footsteps of Frankie from Frankie and Grace and pack on some pounds of knowledge as well? I’m sure the CPLC will dish up much-needed nourishment, and I look forward to blogging about more of my findings as I concoct a healthy recipe for the future of art history!
This post is part of a series of posts completed as part of the Cluster Pedagogy Learning Community (CPLC) curriculum through the Open CoLab.