NC Reads - Hungry Roots: How Food Communicates Appalachia’s Search for Resilience

North Carolina Reads annually features five books that explore issues of racial, social and gender equity and the history and culture of North Carolina. Join us as we discuss these five books that pose critical questions about how North Carolinians view their role in helping to form a more just and inclusive society. 

May 10 - Hungry Roots: How Food Communicates Appalachia’s Search for Resilience by Ashli Quesinberry Stokes and Wendy Atkins-Sayre 

• Nonfiction. Depictions of Appalachian food culture and practices often romanticize people in the region as good, simple and, often, white. These stereotypes are harmful to the actual people they are meant to describe as well as to those they exclude. In Hungry Roots: How Food Communicates Appalachia’s Search for Resilience, Ashli Quesinberry Stokes and Wendy Atkins-Sayre tell a more complicated story. The authors embark on a cultural tour through food and drinking establishments to investigate regional resilience in and through the plurality of traditions and communities that form the foodways of Southern Appalachia. 

For a free copy of the book, please contact Amanda Dekker at 910-483-7727 ext. 1344 or adekker@cumberlandcountync.gov. 

North Carolina Humanities' North Carolina Reads is a statewide book club exploring issues of racial, social and gender equity and the history and culture of North Carolina. North Carolina Humanities is a statewide nonprofit and affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions, opinions or recommendations expressed do not necessarily represent those of NC Humanities or the National Endowment for the Humanities.