Book Talk: The Painful Truth About Hunger in America

Join CUNY SPH’s Urban Food Policy Institute, for a book talk and presentation of “The Painful Truth about Hunger in America: Why We Must Unlearn Everything We Think We Know—and Start Again” (MIT Press, 2024) by Mariana Chilton, Professor of Health Management and Policy at Dornsife School of Public Health at Drexel University and founder of the Center for Hunger-Free Communities.

Drawing on 25 years of research, programming, and advocacy efforts, Dr. Chilton compellingly demonstrates that food insecurity is created and maintained by people in power. The intimate interviews she conducted with many Black and Brown women reveal that the experience of hunger is rooted in trauma and gender-based violence—violence in our relationships with one another, with the natural world, and with ourselves—and that if we want to fix hunger, we must transform our society through compassion, love, and connection.

Moderator:

• Nevin Cohen, Director, CUNY Urban Food Policy Institute, and Associate Professor, CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy