Speaker to discuss food industry as part of Wyman Speaker Series

February 21, 2024 – Joshua Specht, an expert on the food industry and its varied societal impacts, is the featured speaker for a Wednesday, March 6, presentation for the Walker and Helen Wyman Performing Arts and Speaker Series at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. 

Specht’s presentation “Work in the Slaughterhouse, Work in the Kitchen: A Historical Perspective on the Possibilities and Limits of Food Politics,” is from 4:40-6 p.m. in the North Hall Auditorium, 410 S. 3rd St., River Falls. The event is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be served. 

In his presentation, Specht, associate professor of history at the University of Notre Dame, will examine labor along the food supply chain and how people attach meaning to the foods we prepare and consume. He will discuss how those perceptions, in turn, impact such issues as prices, environmental impacts and labor related to the food industry, and whether society can escape those dynamics.  

Specht’s work focuses on the intersections of work, environments, markets and identity. His book, “Red Meat Republic: A Hoof-to-Table History of How Beef Changed America,” was published by Princeton University Press in 2019.

The event is sponsored by the Walker D. and Helen Bryant Wyman Endowment. For more information about the event, call 715-425-4170 or email john.ryan.fischer@uwrf.edu.