Margaret Visser
{{Short description|Canadian writer and broadcaster}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Margaret Visser
| image =
| alt =
| caption =
| birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1940|05|11}}
| birth_place =
| death_date =
| death_place =
| nationality = Canadian
| other_names =
| known_for = widely cited expert on the etiquette of dining
| occupation = writer, broadcaster, academic
}}
Margaret Visser (born May 11, 1940) is a Canadian writer and broadcaster who lives in Toronto, Paris, and South West France. Her subject matter is the history, anthropology, and mythology of everyday life.
Biography
Born in South Africa, she attended school in Zambia, Zimbabwe, France (the Sorbonne) and the University of Toronto where she earned a PhD in Classics.
Visser taught Greek and Latin at York University in North York, Toronto for 18 years. For several years Visser regularly appeared on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's popular radio program Morningside in conversations with Peter Gzowski. Her writing has won many awards, including the Glenfiddich Award for Food Book of the Year in Britain in 1989, the International Association of Culinary Professionals' Literary Food Writing Award, and the Jane Grigson Award. Visser delivered the 2002 CBC Massey Lectures. Her topic was "Beyond Fate."{{cite news |author=Canadian Broadcasting Corporation |title=Beyond Fate |url=http://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-2002-cbc-massey-lectures-beyond-fate-1.2946868 |publisher=CBC Radio, Ideas|access-date=December 20, 2015}}
Visser is married to Colin Visser, professor emeritus of the English Department of the University of Toronto.
In 2017, Visser's 1992 book, The Rituals of Dinner was re-issued, on her birthday, and The Guardian{{'}}s review of it noted her wry humour. The review noted "Twenty-five years after its first publication, Visser’s book remains a delightful guide to how we eat, and why it matters."
In 2018, the Washington Post cited Visser, on the etiquette of cannibalism, from her 1992 book on dining manners, The Rituals of Dinner, when reporting on the bizarre case of a California high school girl who claimed she served her classmates cookies that contained her grandfather's ashes.
In September, 2019, Visser was one of the experts interviewed for a documentary on what recent archeological discoveries say about Mayan dining habits.
Publications
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=vJ_-pd7RKa8C&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = Much Depends on Dinner: The Extraordinary History and Mythology, Allure and Obsessions, Perils and Taboos, of an Ordinary Meal
| publisher = Grove Press
| year = 1986
| author = Margaret Visser
| isbn = 9781443403702
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}, {{OCLC|820146147}}
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=2x4gr8isbUQC&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = The Rituals Of Dinner: The Origins, Evolution, Eccentricities, and Meaning of Table Manners
| author = Margaret Visser
| publisher = HarperCollins
| year = 1992
| isbn = 9781443417327
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=omSYHu6qSnkC&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = Geometry Of Love
| author = Margaret Visser
| publisher = HarperCollins
| year = 2000
| isbn = 9781443403696
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=4qe0dX7zLaIC&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = The Way We Are: Collected Essays
| author = Margaret Visser
| publisher = HarperCollins
| year = 2000
| isbn = 9781443403719
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=VQju_wEnbekC&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = Beyond Fate: CBC Massey lectures series
| author = Margaret Visser
| publisher = House of Anansi
| isbn = 9780887846793
| year = 2002
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}
- {{cite book
| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=uDzshi-Vx0AC&q=Margaret+Visser
| title = The Gift of Thanks: The Roots and Rituals of Gratitude
| author = Margaret Visser
| publisher = HMH
| year = 2008
| isbn = 9780547428444
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote =
}}
References
{{Reflist|refs=
{{cite news
| url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/11/the-rituals-of-dinner-by-margaret-visser-review
| title = The Rituals of Dinner by Margaret Visser review – why table manners matter
| work = The Guardian
| author = John Gallagher
| date = 2017-05-11
| archive-url =
| archive-date =
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote = With the wry humour that enlivens this book, she remarks: {{'}}Nothing so unites us as gathering with one mind to murder someone we hate, unless it is coming together to share in a meal.{{'}}
}}
{{cite news
| url = https://hyperallergic.com/515712/the-history-context-and-legacy-of-an-ancient-maya-plate/
| title = The History, Context, and Legacy of an Ancient Maya Plate: Four experts peel back the layers of history hidden in an object that people believe was once used to serve white venison tamales centuries ago.
| work = Hyperallergic
| author = Hrag Vartanian
| date = 2019-09-03
| archive-url =
| archive-date =
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote = In this episode, we talk to four experts in the field, Gardiner Museum educator and curator Siobhan Boyd, Metropolitan Museum curator James Doyle, cultural historian Margaret Visser, and Popti storyteller Maria Monteja to peel back the layers of history in this wondrous artifact from ancient times to learn about Maya traditions and culture through the lens of today.
}}
{{cite news
| url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/food/wp/2018/10/18/a-teen-allegedly-baked-her-grandfathers-ashes-into-cookies-and-fed-them-to-classmates/
| title = A teen allegedly baked her grandfather's ashes into cookies — and fed them to classmates
| newspaper = Washington Post
| author = Maura Judkis
| date = 2018-10-18
| archive-url =
| archive-date =
| access-date = 2019-09-19
| quote = If the girl who baked her grandfather into the cookies ate one, this would make her an endocannibal — someone who eats the remains of a relative or fellow tribesperson. According to Margaret Visser’s book “The Rituals of Dinner: The Origins, Evolution, Eccentricities and Meaning of Table Manners,” endocannabalism has been practiced by ancient tribes throughout history, who “can, and indeed must, ‘take in’ the life essence of a dead fellow tribesman by eating him after he has died a natural death.
}}
}}
External links
- [http://www.margaretvisser.com Official website]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Visser, Margaret}}
Category:South African people of Dutch descent
Category:University of Paris alumni
Category:University of Toronto alumni
Category:Canadian radio personalities
Category:South African expatriates in Canada
Category:20th-century Canadian women writers
Category:20th-century Canadian non-fiction writers
Category:21st-century Canadian women writers
Category:21st-century Canadian non-fiction writers