In an act of collaboration, Duke and UNC have jointly chosen a summer reading assignment for members of their respective classes of 2015.
Incoming first-years at Duke and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will be assigned to read “Eating Animals” by Jonathan Safran Foer. The non-fiction book was chosen by a committee of 21 students, faculty and staff from Duke and UNC.
The book, which combines investigations of commercial fishing and farming with personal narratives about Foer’s experience with food culture, will serve as what the Duke Summer Reading Selection Committee describes as students’ “first shared intellectual experience.”
“Eating Animals” was selected from more than 500 nominations collected on both campuses, said Associate Dean of Students Todd Adams, co-chair of the selection committee. The collaboration was a result of discussion between deans at both schools, Adams said. He described the book as “a terrific read.”
“Foer—a talented and celebrated author—had the formidable task of making us think about our choices around food without sounding preachy,” Adams wrote in an e-mail Tuesday. “The book gives light to the culture that exists around the food we produce and eat, and it raises difficult, yet relevant questions that everyone should consider in examining their own relationship with food.”
Adams said the collaboration presented Duke with a way to celebrate its 10th year of the summer reading program. “Eating Animals” will be UNC’s 13th reading assignment. The committee seeks to book the author in the future to speak as part of the 2011 Orientation Week, though he has not yet been booked.
Although Duke has featured fictional works for the past couple of years, senior Priya Bhat, who sat on the committee as former First-Year Advisory Counselor board co-chair, said that the book was chosen for its strengths and relevance to freshmen—not because it is non-fiction.
“This book is about being active in the decisions you make... in a way that really connects to the first-year experience,” Bhat said.
Although the book would appear to be pro-vegetarian, Bhat said that this is not the case.
“It’s not so much an argumentative book,” agreed committee member Nate French, a junior and current co-chair of the FAC Board. “It’s not really a case for vegetarianism as much as a discussion of how we make the decisions we make.”
Although The New York Times gave the book a mixed review, French is confident that freshmen, FACs and other students who choose to read the book will love it.
Foer’s book was one of six finalists that the reading committee considered. The other five books were “The Dew Breaker” by Edwidge Danticat; “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” by Rebecca Skloot; “Losing My Cool” by Thomas Chatterton Williams; “The Sea” by John Banville; and “Shop Class as Soulcraft” by Matthew Crawford.
French drew similarities between “Eating Animals” and last year’s summer reading selection, Ron Currie Jr.’s “Everything Matters.” Although he acknowledged that the books are thematically and structurally different, he said that both encourage intellectual debate.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.