Here’s story in our series Food in the American American Canon which discusses places where food has been made, sold, and eaten in African American literature. African American memoir and fiction are important sources for talking about food traditions, the food industry, and food as identity and power within various contexts and regional differences over time. We look at food in historical context and unpack multiple meanings to individuals, ethnic groups, communities, and businesses, and how those meanings change. In reading Invisible Man one sees southern food's connection to Jazz culture and how businesses such as Tillie’s Chicken Shack in Harlem would locate themselves near jazz clubs because the the music brought with it lucrative late night foot traffic and hungry customers. I wonder what happened to Tillie’s? Was its fate directly related to the dwindling popularity of jazz clubs with the success of the Motown sound?
Food Historian Dr. Frederick Douglass Opie
