ACQL is pleased to announce that the 2021 Barbara Godard Prize has been awarded to Marta Croll-Baehre for their paper “‘Imitation of Empire Cuisine’: An Auto-ethnographic Exploration of the Canadian Artisanal Menu in Conversation with Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill.”
Marta is a Ph.D. student in the English and Cultural Studies program at McMaster University. Inspired by questions that Sara Ahmed poses in Strange Encounters, the presentation compares the author’s experience of eating “innovative Canadian cuisine” at the Aberdeen Tavern, a special occasions restaurant in Hamilton, Ontario, with select descriptions of food preparation and consumption in Fred Wah’s semi-fictional memoir Diamond Grill (1996). The jury admired this paper for its innovative approach that combined literary analysis with cultural studies, supported by a detailed and nuanced discussion of methodology, as well as an effective integration of relevant theoretical frameworks.
