Soul Food has a long history for African Americans, which stems from the roots of slavery. Blacks were often slaves on plantations during the early 50’s and 60’s. As a result, they had to work twice as hard to indicate their existence. From the film, Soul Food represents the main themes of: Love, Togetherness, and Culture. Slavery presented this idea of an economically based system where slave traders studied the slaves they captured and fed them staple crops on plantations such as corn, rice, or yams.This description represents how black people particularly black slaves endured daily constant life struggle.
Slaves often grew their own food, worked long hours both day and night, and were extremely exhausted by the end of the day. They often had to work for their food and provide it for themselves. Hunting and Fishing techniques originated from Africa and were often done with hand crafted tools.
One of the key supporting narratives in the film was that of Food Historian and Author, Dr. Jessica Harris, whose primary job is to educate the public with historically accurate information. This is her take on slavery and what that looked like for African Americans in relation to race and economy: “Slavery may have been racially based but, it was an economic proposition. It wasn’t economic to put all those people in a ship.” (05:48)