“What guides my interests are teaching materials that I would have wanted to learn when I was a student. And I know that many people have not encountered Asian and Asian American Studies, postcolonial, ethnic literature, and I like to introduce that to them. The books I end up teaching are by authors of color, queer authors, etc. If I can have people think that they’ve read something they would have never read before, then it adds to my experience as a professor.”

Dr. Anita Mannur has been teaching courses within the Literature, Asian and Asian American Studies, and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality programs at Miami University since 2010. This semester, Dr. Mannur is teaching English 269, Postcolonial Literature, and English 348, Ethnic American Literatures.

What are you currently working on?

I’m spending most of my time finishing my latest book, called Intimate Eating Publics: Food and Forms of Radical Belonging, which is under contract with Duke University Press. It’s a project I’ve been working on for a long time, and it’s a way of thinking about how food brings people together. I was interested in looking at literature and cultural work that shows people forming connections and intimacies across friend groups, queer possibilities, and even eating alone. When writing about the experience of solo dining, I wanted to consider that so

lo dining is not a failure, but that people can still access happiness and fulfillment without always having to be eating with others. With this book, I hope to challenge the way we feel about eating and sociality.

I’m also currently teaching English 269, Postcolonial Literature, and English 348, Ethnic American Literatures.

What drew you to your subject area?

Teaching-wise, I really like teaching works that students may not have read before. What guides my interests are teaching materials that I would have wanted to learn when I was a student. And I know that many people have not encountered Asian and Asian American Studies, postcolonial, ethnic literature, and I like to introduce that to them. The books I end up teaching are by authors of color, queer authors, etc. If I can have people think that they’ve read something they would have never read before, then it adds to my experience as a professor.

In my research, I’ve been working on food subjects since 2000. I’m not interested in conventional literary topics; I like looking at objects and putting them at the center of scholarship that reveals new ways of thinking about race, politics, identities, sexuality, ethnicity, etc. I’ve just always liked food!

Can you tell us a little about your pedagogical methods and how they’ve evolved over time?

I tend to really value discussion above all else. I do know that there are certain concepts and ideas that need explanation, so I provide some frameworks initially. But, for me, it’s important for people to talk even if they don’t want to. What’s most important in my classes is the process of understanding and coming to terms with the text through conversation. Every class that I teach is going to be different because the content and critiques will come from what the students are interested in, though of course I will intervene when necessary. Learning happens in a shared environment and we need to take ownership of our learning. I don’t promise mastery of a text, but you will leave thinking about how a given text fits with our specific socio-political moment.

If you could instill one concept in your students, what would it be?

I would like my students to be generous—generous in their understanding of when their authors are doing experimental things, generous in understanding different world views, generous to others. And, to a certain extent, being generous also means being generous to yourself and not being afraid to share your own ideas.

Can you tell us a little about your experience at Miami so far?

I work in a really great department. You won’t find as many English departments around the country that value interdisciplinarity and literature from people of color. You know, I’m not the only Asian-Americanist—there are three of us! I know that I’m one of the few women of color on faculty on this campus. In that sense, there are students who will take my classes because they identify with me. So I spend a lot of time talking to students about navigating what it’s like to be a person of color on a mostly white campus. But I think there needs to be more of us, for sure!

And I hope it’s obvious that I like students! I feel that’s what’s going on in the world, your generation is grappling with issues of inequity in ways that earlier generations didn’t have to. So I think that the kinds of classes I teach offer spaces to think about these issues, and in the past four or five years I’ve encountered fewer of the “Miami” student and more students who are curious about these issues. And I can learn a lot from all of my students.

What’s your must-read book(s) recommendation?

Right now, The Great Derangement by Amitav Ghosh. Even though I don’t agree with everything he says, it makes us think about the 

urgency of climate change. To me, that’s one of the big issues that people need to think about right now.

A funny must-read is The Shakespeare Requirement by Julie Schumacher because it humorously captures what it’s like working in an English department.

And I tell everyone to read Cereus Blooms at Night by Shani Mootoo because it does beautiful things with all of the things I care about: unexpected friendships, trauma, social justice, caring about the world, etc. It weaves it all together in a way that’s very moving.

Interviewed by: Jessi Wright