THE Crediton Living Library of Food Memories will host an evening event at the Crediton Library on Wednesday, October 16.

Those who take part will share memories related to any aspect of food, from work they have done growing, trading, and serving food, to experiences they have had cooking and eating.

The event follows on from a series of sessions held at the Crediton Library during the summer.

The Living Library encourages those taking part to create memory books that can be shared with others. Those attending this event will have the opportunity to work on memory books and to share these with other participants. The event is open to all.

The Crediton Living Library of Food Memories brings people together to share memories about food and to strengthen social connections.

Food has extraordinary power to connect people. We feed our families. Many of us earn a living from producing, trading, preparing or serving food to others. Food preferences and habits shape our social communities and identities. Food even connects us with our forebears. Indeed, memories of food are among the strongest connections that many of us have with the past—whether in the form of individual reminiscences or a shared culinary heritage.

Project Activities. Include events and Book Making and Exhibition.

EVENTS?The Project is organising events—often in conjunction with other local organisations—where people converse about their memories with one another. Such memories may be of a dish someone used to make; of ways in which food used to be produced or prepared; of special meals had with friends or loved ones; or of places where memorable foods were once grown, bought, or eaten.

BOOK MAKING

Book Making and Exhibition: The Project also gathers and preserve people’s food memories in the form of hand-made books. These may take the form of recipes with notes; short handwritten stories; photos or objects with captions; or drawings. These books are curated by the project as a form of community heritage and made available for reading at project events and in local community spaces.

Through these activities, the project stimulates conversations about food, the social contexts in which it is embedded, and how both of these are changing. Some of these conversations are between family members reconnecting with a shared past.

Others are between members of the community who may or may not already know each other—who may find one another’s memories familiar or who may discover the variations in experience that enrich our community today. While many of these memories are pleasant, some are difficult; in either case, participants find comfort in sharing them with others.

The project’s activities are designed to strengthen connections within the Crediton community—whether between people who grew up in the region and those who have come to it more recently; between people whose daily routines rarely lead them to meet; or between young people and elder members of the community.

As they learn about how food was made, marketed and eaten in the past, family members learn things they never knew about one another.

New arrivals to Crediton and long-standing residents have the chance to meet and learn about each other. Young people have the opportunity to ask whether or not historical changes have been for the better of for the worse, as well as what sort of future they might hope for. And older participants benefit from activities and events designed to address social isolation and loneliness.

The project is organised by: Harry G West, who lives in Knowle and teaches Food Studies at the University of Exeter; and Paul Cleave, who lives in Crediton and is a Research Fellow in Food History at the University of Exeter. It is supported in part by the Crediton Town Council.

The organisers may be contacted via email: [email protected] or: [email protected] .