I thought that Professor Vooris’ presentation on Lesbianism, Food and Gender was fascinating. As a queer black person, I oftentimes reflect only on my experiences as being black in relation to food, but never to my queerness. So, I found it interesting that her work focused on this intersection. Lesbian food culture was not a topic I thought of, and it makes me think of ways I can include this into my project for the semester. I thought it was fascinating that food companies often target specific  genders through advertisement and production purposes. Specifically, meats are associated with masculinity and men. Also, the photos of women laughing while eating salad shows how diet culture targets women and can have negative effects on the psychology of food interpretation. She also talked on heteronormativity and did a wonderful job at articulating how this plays out in relation to gender and food. The assumption that people are straight, institutions uphold heterosexuality as the norm, representations of families/couples = straight, while different institutions that push for straightness. I also enjoyed understanding things through a queer and feminism framework that does not orient the discussion on the heteronormative framework that is overused at this point. I hope to find ways to incorporate many of these overarching themes in my final project, and this really helps put things in an interesting perspective.