The Trouble with Snack Time

An important study of the ways in which feeding children reflects larger social anxieties, from issues of class and racial identities to morally loaded ideas about nutrition and childrearing. While recognizing the centrality of parental engagement to children’s lives, Patico compellingly asserts the need for governmental interventions to bring about structural changes that don’t rely on moralized notions of individual parental care. Everyone interested in how America feeds its children—or fails to—should read this book. ~Darra Goldstein, Founding Editor of Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture

A beautifully written account of the double bind faced by many contemporary parents: how to be ‘engaged’ and ‘concerned’ about their children’s eating, without being overly ‘neurotic’ or ‘anxious.’ Thick with detailed ethnographic observation, the book illuminates the politics of parenting from the ground up, forcing the reader to reflect on why children’s eating has become both individualized and moralized in recent years, as well as pushing us to consider other, more collaborative possibilities. In addition to parents themselves, this highly readable book will be of interest to those across the social sciences, particularly scholars of parenting, gender, food, and health. ~Charlotte Faircloth, University College London

This book is rife with interesting details, describing a life that will be familiar to many academics. ~CHOICE

The Trouble With Snack Time by Dr. Jennifer Patico explores this food environment through a fascinating ethnography of an Atlanta charter school and its surrounding neighbourhood. ~Agriculture and Human Values