Welcome to University of California San Diego, Food Studies classes!

This is a space where students describe their own foodie roots and interest in foods, ingredients, and food cultures. This  course is designed to deepen your knowledge of key issues in food studies as an emerging field of significance. Students will delve into weekly topics concerning some challenges of food culture with attention to topics such as food security, food markets, restaurant and commercial foods, foods among diaspora communities, the origins of modern crops, genetically modified foods, trends in health foods, and problems of malnutrition. While we’ll discuss concerns of people in various world areas, the focus will be on Old World food traditions. Some of the questions we’ll ask include, 'How has wheat crop insecurity in places such as Ukraine influenced geopolitics?'; ‘How are cultural tastes for ethnic  foods satisfied in diaspora communities?'; 'Why is rice significant across Asian cuisines?'; ‘What are the costs and benefits of genetically modified crops?’ For the capstone research component, students will write a theoretically informed paper on a food commodity's history, politics, trade, economics, cultural ties, or market trends. And more!