Victory Gardens to "Clean" Eating: Women, Food and Identity in 20th CE America/German and British-American "G.I. Babies," growing up in a post-WWII world

1. Victory Gardens to 'Clean' Eating: Women, Food and Identity in America, 1940-Present 

Recently it seems as if every other young, American female adult is "eating clean," going raw," or embarking on a 5-day juice cleanse. Upscale groceries stores that pride themselves on organic, locally-sourced and non-GMO foods like Whole Foods and Trader Joe's have become the go to for the health conscious, sustainably-minded young woman. It seems like social media sites like Pinterest and Instagram have so often now become platforms on which young women document and share their personal journeys and struggles with health, food and their own bodies. I think lawyer turned gastronomist Jean-Anthelme Brilliat-Savarin's was on to something when he famously said, "Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are," in 1826. Our food choices, where we buy our food, how we prepare it and how we present often represent our ethnic or cultural identities, but do they say anything more about us? Perhaps politically, ethically, morally or personally? I know it has been true for me. As a young, American adult woman who struggled for some time with restrictive and orthorexic tendencies, the way I chose to prepare and consume food undeniably reflected the "unhealthy" identity (perfectionistic, Type-A, etc.) I had constructed for myself. Recovering from this meant both changing my eating tendencies and imagining and reconstructing a new identity for myself. 

Although there is a bit of psychological and historical research on the link between food and ethnic/immigrant identity in the United States, few have tackled the question of identity, particularly in women, and its relationship with food production, preparation and consumption. Since this this is a history class, I would like to focus specifically on the extent to which women, historically, have used food production, preparation and consumption as platforms for constructing and imagining identity (and perhaps challenging gender roles?) in the U.S. I will most likely ground my research in two periods in U.S. history: WWII on the U.S. home front and the in Natural Health Movements of 1960s and 70s (I may end up focusing on just one of them if it appears the project is getting to large). 

Some of my early thoughts: On the U.S. WWII home front American women seemed to play an important role in "sowing the seeds of victory," by planting and maintaining "victory gardens" and engaging in food movements outside of the private home that focused on conserving recourses and supporting self-sufficiency, organic farming and sustainable agriculture. Food production and preparation seemed to give American women a space outside of the private home to imagine new identities for themselves or even challenge old gender roles. Similarly the counterculture, "counter cuisine" movements of the 1960s that emphasized a return to organic, local and ethically-produced foods also seemed to be a space in which women could construct new identities for themselves/challenge old gender roles/gain control of their own bodies through the preparation and consumption of food (Johnson). 

Preliminary questions: What is the relationship between food, activism and identity? How has popular/mass media portrayed women in relationship to food during the 20th CE? How has women's relationship with food production, preparation and consumption changed during the 20th CE in the U.S.? What is unique about women's relationship with food, then say men's? To what extent did food production/preparation give women a space to imagine/construct identity and challenge gender roles? Can we still see vestiges from these historical movements in food culture today? 

A couple of possible secondary sources: 
Edible Activism and the Counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s by Sandra Johnson
http://digitalcommons.colby.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1637&context=honorstheses
Food and Gender, Identity and Power by Carole Counihan 
Appetite for Change: How the Counterculture took on the Food Industry by Warren Belasco 
Cultivating Victory: The Women's Land Army and Victory Garden Movement by Cecilia Gowdy-Wygant

Wish list primary sources: 
Government sponsored victory garden posters/ads featuring women, WWII cookbooks/recipes, photographs, letters
1960s commericals/ads featuring women/food, photographs of "co-ops" or "hippy" communes, recipes, letters  

2. German and British-African American "G.I. Babies," growing up in post-WWII Europe/America  

A "G.I." or "war baby" refers to a child born, often illegitimately, to a native parent and a parent belonging to an occupying foreign military force. At no time was this more widespread than in Europe following WWII. As American occupying forces infiltrated Germany and surrounding areas, many developed relationships with European women. However after the babies were born, most of the men were sent home or were quickly moved to different assignments by disapproving officers. Mothers of these children were often stigmatized and shunned by their communities, especially in the case of Germany which was still reeling from its defeat and complete destruction by American forces. Because of this many of these children wound up fatherless and were sometimes orphaned all together. While some of these children were adopted by U.S. families in the 1940s and 1950s many remained in Europe left to grabble with their own identities and faced stigmatization and discrimination for their bi-national and often bi-racial identities. 

For my research paper I would like to focus specifically on the stories, experiences and identities of 'Brown Babies' - a notation used to describe half African-American/half British or German children born to white British/German women and African American G.I.s directly following the U.S.'s occupation of these areas in the 40s. Discriminated and stigmatized for their bi-racial identity, many of these children were essentially 'stateless,' because neither England, Germany or the U.S. accepted them as full, equal citizens. Nevertheless many were still sent to the U.S. Even those adopted by African American families in the U.S. still faced Jim Crow and severe segregation. I would like to delve into Europe's post WWII conditions, investigate how these children navigated racial, nationalized post WWII environments like in orphanages, schools, their homes and communities. I would then like investigate the legal aspects of the issue including the adoption process many of these children went through and their citizenship status. 

Preliminary questions: 
Who were these 'Brown Babies' and what became of many of them? Who were their fathers and mothers? How did their bi-racial, bi-national identities play into how they navigated post WWII conditions (in orphanages, schools, etc.)? What challenges did they face in these spaces? How did Germany, England and the U.S. deal with 'Brown Babies,' legally and socially? What were the differences and similarities between how these countries chose to deal with them? What sort of psychological and social effects did these conditions have on these children? Do officials in the U.S., Germany or England have a responsibility to them now? If so, what could be done? 

Couple of possible secondary sources: 
"Germany's 'Brown Babies,' Must be Helped! Will You?" U.S. Adoption Plans for Afro-German Children, 1950-1955 by Muinz de Fara 
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/callaloo/v026/26.2lemke.html
A Nation's Undesirables - Mischlingskinder and Whiteness: Post-WWII German Brown Babies by Tracey Patton 
http://repository.uwyo.edu/sjrc_awards/22/
A Forgotten Legacy of the Second World War: GI Children in Post War Britain and Germany by Sabine Lee 
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstractfromPage=online&aid=8253353&fileId=S096077731100004X

Wish list primary sources: 
Any correspondence/letters between GI's and British/German mothers, diaries or oral accounts from GI babies growing up in Great Britain Germany and/or America, copies of Jet and Ebony African American magazines/newspapers from the 1950s, photographs, GI babies passports