Activist Saru Jayaraman will explore the themes of food justice, food sovereignty and food security in the next Lorwin Lecture at the UO.

The talk, “Forked: A New Standard for American Dining,” will take place at 3:30 p.m. Monday, Jan. 23, in the Knight Library Browsing Room. It is free and open to the public.

Jayaraman will discuss the ways restaurant workers are treated at some of America’s favorite restaurants, juxtaposed with new models for elevating the working conditions of restaurant workers. She will also touch on economic vulnerability, food justice and the living wage movement for today’s restaurant workers.

Jayaraman is the co-founder and co-director of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United and director of the Food Labor Research Center at University of California, Berkeley. After 9/11, together with displaced World Trade Center workers, she co-founded restaurant workers group, which now has more than 18,000 worker members, 200 employer partners and several thousand consumer members in a dozen states nationwide.

In addition, a panel discussion will be held at 10 a.m. featuring advocates for farmworker rights, food sovereignty and food security under the rubric of “food first/first food.” The panel will feature speakers and advocates from the Pacific Northwest who are active in education, urban food systems, ecological restoration, first foods revitalization, Native youth environmental justice and stewardship.

The Lorwin Lectureship on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties is funded by a gift from Val and Madge Lorwin to the University of Oregon College of Arts and Sciences and School of Law. This is the third in the Lorwin Lecture series.

The events are hosted and sponsored by the Center for the Study of Women in Society and co-sponsored by the Food Studies Program, Department of Ethnic Studies, and the Labor Education and Research Center.