School of Social Work doctoral candidate Allison Bates is studying African foodways and their connection to social identity and health in the Black community. For a class project related to contextualizing her work in the digital world, Bates created a web-based multimedia project to explore the relationships between historical and current dietary patterns and health outcomes in this population.
Her History & Health website features recommended reads, such as the books Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs: Black Women, Food, and Power and High on the Hog: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America; online resources, including the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Minority Health and Black Health Matters; and a forum with suggested discussion topics, for example, the influence of history on current eating patterns in the Black community and which traditional African foods can assist with decreasing risk factors and symptoms of chronic illnesses.