Sometimes the stars align
Good news! The value of your investment in The Food Section has just gone up, with the newsletter this week earning two award nominations from the James Beard Foundation. The Food Section is in the running for the Columns and Newsletters prize, as well as the award for Dining and Travel writing.
Going into nomination announcement day on Wednesday, I didn’t expect to receive a nomination—let alone two!—for three good reasons. One, these kinds of subjective awards are inherently fluky. Evaluating journalism isn’t the same as officiating a 100-meter dash.
Two, while I’ve been told that I write like I’m taller than I am, The Food Section is still just me: The Beards draw entries from enormous media organizations with million-dollar budgets. For example, in the Dining and Travel contest, I’m up against Garden & Gun and Bon Appetit, which is published by global media conglomerate Conde Nast.
Three, and most importantly, I figured I’d sunk my own chances with my non-alignment “alignment statement.”
Folks who’ve assumed the sane position of not following the James Beard awards closely may not have come across that phrase before. In short, the foundation overhauled its award procedures after its 2020 Restaurant & Chef ballot reportedly didn’t produce enough Black winners. I’ve written previously about my hunch that those adjustments wouldn’t produce hoped-for change, so won’t belabor the point here, except to say the adoption of “alignment statements” was at the core of my concern.
Under the new system, restaurants and chefs are invited to self-nominate by submitting an alignment statement, via print or video, “reflecting on the James Beard Awards Mission and the James Beard Foundation’s Values, and how the entrant expresses them in their work.”
To be clear, there is nothing wrong with the foundation’s values, which include equity, integrity, and respect. But it feels like requiring entrants to fall into philosophical lockstep with an award-giving body runs directly contrary to the goal of diversifying participation. Plus, many talented food-and-beverage professionals have neither the time nor PR money to produce polished statements.
What’s especially odd about alignment statements is the public never sees them, even though one of the foundation’s six guiding values is Transparency.
Since I was curious what sort of alignment statement could help secure a nomination, I asked the five finalists for Best Chef: Southeast to share what they’d sent with their applications. (For my take on this year’s nominee class—and how it goes to show that concerns about the new process weren’t unfounded—check out my latest column in The Assembly.)
I never heard back from the publicists for Josh Habiger of Bastion, Terry Koval of The Deer and the Dove, or Paul Smith of 1010 Bridge. A press representative for Sam Hart of Counter provided his video. And Sam Fore of Tuk Tuk Sri Lankan Bites, a chef who’s appeared in The Food Section, told me she’d never heard of alignment statements.
“I didn’t nominate myself,” she texted. “I have no clue who did.”
In the case of Restaurant & Chef awards, competitors don’t have to apply. The awards committee can longlist anyone it feels is deserving of the honor. According to a James Beard Foundation spokeswoman, when that happens, a committee member is appointed to write an alignment statement for the person or company.
Media awards, though, are different. You have to enter if you want your work considered. That means the alignment statement is non-negotiable.
Anyhow, here’s mine, as submitted on November 30, 2022.
This is an awkward way to start a statement, but pressing ahead in the spirit of transparency:
As an independent journalist, I’m not in a position to align with organizations or advance their missions. I am beholden only to the truth and the readers I serve, and obliged to put their interests first.
The bylaws of the defunct Association of Food Journalists spelled out this situation explicitly: “Membership is open to food journalists who report or edit food stories intended to deepen audience members’ understanding of the world around them, for reasons other than the advancement of non-media corporate interests, charitable causes, or partisan politics.”
In other words, adopting or prioritizing the James Beard Foundation’s values would amount to a violation of my ethical integrity and conflict with my professional responsibilities. But I’m happy to review here the values that inform my work, and hope you’ll consider that an acceptable substitute for what’s requested.
I launched The Food Section to make up for the lack of rigorous food journalism across the region, despite the outsized role that restaurants play in Americans’ lives, particularly in the realms of labor, race and gender relations, public health, and the environment.
While media outlets everywhere have a regrettable tendency to treat food as a lighthearted diversion, the scarcity of true food journalism in the South—where food is exceptionally important and culture is contested—is especially shameful.
My goal is to recalibrate harmful inequities by providing industry workers and patrons with the information they need—and respect they deserve—and prompting the privileged to reconsider their prejudices. The Food Section strives to help locate the balance of joy and justice that’s at the heart of hospitality by challenging assumptions, holding power to account, and publishing stories that readers aren’t likely to find anywhere else.
Many, many thanks to the paying subscribers who have made it possible for this newsletter to do just that. Imagine what else we could do with just a little more support.
Have a great weekend.
Take care,
Hanna
p.s. The James Beard Media Awards ceremony is in Chicago on June 3. I’ll keep you posted!
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