CONVIVIAL FOODSCAPES

The project focuses on convivial foodscapes as a response to the needs of the modern world

CONVIVIUM will consolidate efforts in re-connection, re-attachment, and re-enchantment under the umbrella concept of “convivial foodscapes”. Foodscapes refer to the tangible and intangible environments wherein food-related values and representations are negotiated, and where nostalgia, emotions and imagination linked to foodways are manifested. Conviviality refers to what we can designate as an “enhanced togetherness”; the outcome of a culture of cooperation, reciprocity, interdependence, and regeneration, which widens the classical understanding of community beyond the human. It emphasizes strong interdependencies between all forms of life and existence in the planet, while acknowledging that inequality, conflict, negotiation, and distance, are as much part of convivial relations as mutualism and collaboration. It will help to envision food cultures beyond the borders of nations, regions, disciplines, and generations, and their associated culinary products or practices.

The members of CONVIVIUM champion food heritage as catalyzers of changes in people’s perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors. By creating cultural-based solutions that are relevant and aesthetically appealing, they will positively affect the values, traditions, and norms of communities to ultimately promote lifestyles that are more sustainable, greener, and inclusive. They will achieve this by adopting an ethic of collaboration in resonance with the notions of shared heritage and conviviality, in which the idea of collaboration means “co-labor” and the idea of singular individuals in collaboration become “we”.

The photos come from the Kick-off Meeting that took place in Coimbra in January. where all the participants from different countries, with different culinary traditions, could learn about local products, cook side by side and then feast at a table set together.