Zadie Smith on the Culinary Arts Part 2 of 2
William Augustus Henderson, The Housekeeper’s Instructor, 1791
Here is more on my culinary rift on the interview Fresh Air's Terry Gross did with novelist Sadie Smith. An ardent feminist, which I am too, Smith insists that the historic restrictions on women outside the home resulted in a Eurocentric interpretation of feminism that labeled cooking as bondage with little room for viewing it as a creative outlet for all its practitioners. She says, “I just learned to cook at the age of 41 and I find enormous enjoyment in the process.” The issue is feminism undermined those creative outlets for women as a form of mail dominance. Smith maintains that we all have the desire to create and when one group condemns a specific form of creative outlet such as the culinary arts we discourage the exploration of it and the satisfaction that can come from it. Her critique of the Western feminism she grew up learning and practicing provide some interesting food for thought. Here is my take, along with financial literacy and the ability to swim, culinary literacy should be a requirement for graduating from a US high school because all three are necessary life skills.
