Call for papers: Amsterdam Symposium on the History of Food 2025

On 5 and 6 June 2025, the 8th Amsterdam Symposium on the History of Food will take place at Allard Pierson, University of Amsterdam. This year’s topic is: Food and the City

This year's symposium will mark a special edition because it takes place in the 750th anniversary year of the city of Amsterdam. The symposium will also be organized during an exhibition on the history of food culture in the city of Amsterdam, taking place 11 April to 7 September 2025 in the Allard Pierson.

Food and the City
Cities have played a central role in the history of food. Their impact on the organization of food systems, the rise of modern food technologies, and the emergence of new food cultures and identities has been so profound that some scholars have declared it difficult to “separate urban food history from food history tout court.” The growth of cities, towns, and other dense settlements, in turn, has been shaped decisively by geographies of food production and consumption within and across city borders. Food trade, imperialism, and migration have expanded metropoles’ transportation networks, sensory landscapes, and culinary infrastructures. Migrant marketplaces have forged new alignments of global food chains, conjuring new forms of customs, commerce and cuisine.

Meanwhile, the historical study of food and cities has long been a generative field of inquiry for food historians, urban historians and scholars from related disciplines. Important theoretical concepts, such as migrant marketplaces, culinary infrastructures, diasporic sensescapes, and omnivorousness were articulated within scholarly inquiries of food and cities and owe much to their productive interdependence. Unlike most other academic programs, major scholarly centres for food history and food studies have developed in close collaboration with city partners and local urban communities, forging new models for transdisciplinary inquiry and activist scholarship.

This year’s symposium aims to showcase and further extend these developments. It seeks to highlight the transformative power of cities within the history of food, and the crucial role of urban foodways in shaping the historical trajectory of urban environments. It invites new perspectives on the environmental, logistical, social, and cultural challenges posed by food production, retail, consumption, and promotion in cities. We particularly encourage the submission of papers that build connections between food history and related fields and that expand the methodological, thematic, chronological, and geographic diversity of food history. Abstracts for papers may address any topic related to the study of food and the city including, but not limited to, the following themes:

· Cities and their ‘hinterlands’ (rural & colonial)
· Eating at home and eating out
· Urban food policy and regulation
· Migration and food
· Hygiene, health, and the city
· Urban food inequality, food apartheid, and food deserts
· Food activism and food sovereignty in the city
· Urban agriculture
· Circular economies and sustainability

Guidelines for Paper Proposals
The symposium program will consist of a keynote lecture, paper presentations and panel discussions. You can join us in Amsterdam or participate online. If you are interested in presenting a paper at the symposium, please submit an abstract of max. 250 words before 15 January 2025. Please expect to be presenting to an audience of up to 100 people, comprised of academic as well as professional participants. An online presentation is also possible. The symposium language is English. Presenters of accepted papers are asked to deliver a lively and engaging 20-minute presentation, followed by a discussion with the panel and audience, moderated by a session chair. After the Symposium, authors of select papers will have the opportunity to revise their contributions for inclusion in a special issue or edited volume.

Applications should include:
· Title of the proposed paper
· Abstract (maximum 250 words)
· Biographical information (short CV)
· Contact information (email, telephone, and postal address)

Applications must be submitted by the deadline of 15 January to: Foodhistory-ub@uva.nl.

Notification of acceptance:
As it may not be possible to include all submissions, the organizing committee and advisory board will make a selection. You will be notified of the decision regarding your paper by 15 February 2025.

Advisory board:
Louise O. Fresco; Claudia Roden; Peter Scholliers; Irene E. Zwiep