Belize, a tiny corner of the Caribbean wedged into Central America, has been a fast food nation since buccaneers and pirates first stole ashore. As early as the 1600s it was already caught in the great paradox of globalization: how can you stay local and relish your own home cooking, while tasting the delights of the global marketplace? Menus, recipes and bad colonial poetry combine with Wilk's sharp anthropological insight to give an important new perspective on the perils and problems of globalization.
Richard Wilk is professor of anthropology and gender studies at Indiana University where he directs the Food Studies Program. With a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Arizona, he has taught at the University of California Berkeley, University of California Santa Cruz, New Mexico State University, and University College London, and has held fellowships at Gothenburg University and the University of London. His research in Belize, the USA and West Africa has been supported by two Fulbright fellowships, grants from the National Science Foundation, and from many other organizations. He has also worked as an applied anthropologist with UNICEF, USAID, USDA, Cultural Survival and a variety of other development organizations. Most recently he has testified in several important Indian land tenure cases in the Belize Supreme Court. His initial research on the cultural ecology of indigenous Mayan farming and family organization was followed by work on consumer culture and sustainable consumption, energy consumption, globalization, television, beauty pageants and food. Much of his recent work has turned towards the history of food, the linkages between tourism and sustainable development, and the origin of modern masculinity. His publications include more than 125 papers and book chapters, a textbook in Economic Anthropology, and several edited volumes.
When he is not teaching or writing, Rick is cooking, eating, fishing, turning wooden bowls and platters, or traveling somewhere to give a lecture or visit a student. He is extremely proud of the wonderful graduate students he has had an opportunity to work with at Indiana, many of whom have gone on to brilliant careers. The chance to work with creative, intelligent and committed students keeps him young, mentally alive, and always developing new interests and ideas.
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