The Italian Institute of Culture is delighted to host the second event of Airitalks, where science meets people.
AIRItalks are informal seminars held by Italian academics living in Scotland on topics spanning from medicine, immunology, psychology, art, engineering, literature, philosophy and much more.
In this second appointment with AIRItalks we will host Patrizia Sambuco (Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Cultural Memory, School of Advanced Studies, University of London) and food historian Kelly A. Spring (Southern Maine University) together with Federico Lubrani, Federico Lubrani, Chair of Slow Food Glasgow.
Patrizia Sambuco and Kelly A. Spring's talk, Eating Under Fire: Food in WWII Britain and Italy, will bring the audinece back in time providing them with a real taste of those days. Have you got an Italian relative or a person you know who was living in Italy during WWII? How could they survive? What were they eating? What was the situation like here in Britain? Can we make a comparison?
These and other questions will be answered during an event where you will be able to see the types of bread, coffee, tea and other food available in Italy and Britain during WWII. Experts will introduce you to the food situation in both countries. In the second part of the event, a performance will follow where readings of diaries and memoirs of people living in Italy and Britain during WWII will give you an idea of how people were feeling about food. As a memento, copies of British and Italian wartime recipes will be made available together with information cards to further explore the topic.
This talk is part of the Being Human Festival.
In the second talk of the evening Bread & Society: the symbolism of a food Staple, Federico Lubrani will discuss the social and anthropological importance of bread.
Dr Patrizia Sambuco (Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Cultural Memory, School of Advanced Studies, University of London) is a specialist of modern and contemporary Italian culture. Among her publications: Corporeal Bonds (UTP, 2012), Corpi e linguaggi (Il Poligrafo, 2014), Italian Women Writers 1800-2000 (FDUP, 2015), Transmissions of Memory: Echoes, Traumas and Nostalgia in Post-WWII Italian Culture (FDUP, 2018).
Dr. Kelly A. Spring (Southern Maine University) is a food historian, whose research examines the impact of Second World War and postwar food rationing on the social, cultural, economic and political structures of British society. She is currently working on a trans-Atlantic history of US-UK food networks from 1941 to 1947
Federico Lubrani is Chair of Slow Food Glasgow. He is a specialist in the conservation of tangible and intangible heritage and occasionally lectures in conservation of the built heritage. He is also active in supporting film festivals. Author of 'Instruments to aid the reintegration of colour gaps after Brandi's Teoria' (CRAC, 2008)
