These two pieces, Her Cheeto Heart by Jill McCorkle, and Not Just A White Girl's Thing by Susan Bordo, do a great job of illustrating two extremes of the eating habits of the world we inhabit, but they do it in strikingly different ways. McCorkle's essay is much more casual in tone and tackles her eating habits in a manner that doesn't paint them as an issue. While on the other hand, Bordo's article is very scholarly in its tone and hits upon a pervasive, class-defying societal issue that is very serious in nature; one that lends itself well to a research based, social-science based analysis. They are two very different pieces that many parallels can be drawn from. They both show variations of eating habits, just through two different lenses.
McCorkle writes her piece from a very nostalgic point of view, recounting her favorite deliciously unhealthy treats from her youth. She does this through the sharing of fond personal anecdotes of her childhood and the listing of tasty guilty pleasures that she hopes her audience will connect with and share in her reminiscence. She essentially tells a story of food that revolves around her life's narrative. She also attempts to make emotional connections with her readers through the concept of food, by noting the reactions these foods (which she knows are disgustingly unhealthy) illicit from her. She says food makes her happy, which is a feeling I know I relate to. For that matter, I was even drinking an admittedly unhealthy Mountain Dew and eating flavor blasted goldfish while writing the bulk of this post, because they make me feel good and remind me of home. Food brings many people comfort and piece of mind, which is also a point hit upon in Bordo's article, albeit in a decidedly different light.
Rhetorically, Bordo's piece is very very different. She uses relevant data and quotes from her own research work, as well as other sources, to give her essay a sense of objectivity and reliance on fact rather than focusing on emotional based reader responses such as nostalgia and happiness. Her's is a piece of analytical observation compared to one of flashbacks to bygone days. As a reader, you notice that she is trying to clear up misconceptions that still prevail in the general populace's collective mind. It is thought that anorexia, bulimia, and other assorted eating disorders are a disease of spoiled white girls, when in reality the factors that go into studying eating disorders are much more socially diverse. These diseases cross boundaries of all races and classes, and show that not all people think of eating so fondly as Jill McCorkle.
When read and analyzed as companion pieces, these two articles clearly illuminate the differences in perception of food and its role it plays in a person's life. For some it is a destructive concept that is based in negative idol-worship that leads to crippling disorders that can take over one's life, and for others it is a concept to be pleasantly looked back upon as a reminder of the good times spent savoring the pleasure and excess life had afforded them. As always, a healthy perspective of critical thinking is required to properly contextualize two subjectively valid concepts.
Overall, I agreed with most everything that you said considering both of the articles, but one point that I did not wholly agree upon was the fact McCorkle was actually tackling her eating problems. To me it just sounded like she was rambling without a point.
ReplyDeleteNice analysis, Noah. I appreciate your awareness of the similarities and differences between "Her Chee-to Heart" and "Not Just a White Girls' Thing."
ReplyDeleteThese pieces seem to highlight two sides of the same issue: 1. that unhealthy food is pervasive and addictive, and 2. that we are all bombarded by the media with images of the "perfect" body. It's obvious to see the that this is a devastating combination, one that needs to be addressed.