You are kindly invited to attend two guest lectures on food media and digital food culture, exploring how food operates at the intersection of identity, gender, and aesthetics in contemporary (digital) societies. Professor Contois examines “high performance food culture” and how eating practices are used to signal identity and health, while Professor Leer explores the concept of “food porn” and how digital media are reshaping our relationship with food aesthetics and culture.

In this talk, Emily Contois will present from her current book project, Like an Athlete, which explores how elite athleticism has infiltrated American life, extending far beyond the gym and fitness culture. The age of optimization has remade food culture in an athletic image through examples like protein obsession, greens powder superdrinks, performance water beverages, and electrolyte supplements. Contois invites the audience to discuss: How does eating this way seek to communicate to others a healthy, neoliberal identity with exclusionary results? Is high performance food culture emblematic of American exceptionalism or a global phenomenon?

Emily Contois (emilycontois.com) is associate professor of media studies at the University of Tulsa (USA). She researches media within consumer culture, focusing on how identities are formed at the vital intersection of food, the body, and ideas about health. She is the author of Diners, Dudes, and Diets: How Gender and Power Collide in Food Media and Culture (2020) and co-editor of Food Instagram: Identity, Influence, and Negotiation (2022).

How have smartphones changed our relation to food aesthetics? Are restaurants being pornofied? Can food porn be feminist? And what is food porn actually?

In this talk, professor of culinary arts and meal science Jonatan Leer will talk about his upcoming book on the world of food porn and digital food aesthetics that unfolds the history of the concept of food porn co-authored with Danish communication scholar Stinne Gunder Strøm Krogager. The book explores the history of the concept from an academic one to its emergence in popular culture. The talk also explores how food porn can be understood in relation to various fields and conflicts of contemporary digital food culture, including issues of gender, sexuality, populism and class bullying.

Jonatan Leer, Professor of Culinary Arts and Meal Science, Örebro University (Sweden). He has published widely within the domain of food studies and food culture from issues of food and gender to sustainability, food tourism, gastronationalism, gourmet burgers, and food design. He is currently CO-I of the research project “Masculinities in Green Transition” and is currently finishing the book Food Porn: Food Aesthetic in a Digital Age (University of Bristol Press) with Stinne Krogager.

• When? Wedensday 6th of May 2026, 1 PM - 4 PM
• Where? Stadscampus, R-Building, aula S.R.007 (Rodestraat 7, 2000 Antwerp)

Participation is free, but online registration is mandatory