ANSC 184 / INTL 190

Food, Culture, and Society

Winter 2024

Prof. Jana Fortier, PhD

jfortier@ucsd.edu

Zoom: https://ucsd.zoom.us/j/3043391783

ANSC 184: T/Th 11-12:20 in PODEM 0133

INTL 190: Weds., 2-4:50 in RBC 3203

Off hrs: 12:30-1:30 T/Th or by appt 

Class Access: http://canvas.ucsd.edu/

This course is designed to deepen your knowledge of key issues in food studies as an emerging field of significance in international studies. 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 will 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.

Learning Outcomes

•Recognize how geography, climate change, and politics influence particular food systems 

•Recognize key metrics involving food insecurity on a national level

•Appreciate the significant diversity of food cultures in class readings

•Be able to discuss the pro’s and cons of regenerative crops and bioengineered foods

•Master key ideas and conceptual frameworks in food studies

•Appreciate the transfer of significant domestic plants and animals in the Columbian Exchange

•Become familiar with food commodities and trading issues 

•Become familiar with major food nutritional values and dietary issues such as malnutrition

Course Requirements  

You will probably have a few days when you feel unable to get to your lectures, or finish a weekly question, or join in discussions. Don’t get discouraged! Just email or ask to teleconference with me. Let me know if you need help with a research paper topic, if you want me to review your writing, or if you want to clarify some concepts. Sometimes I miss seeing an email, too, so don’t be shy about sending a request twice.

1. Attendance & Participation. We generally have classroom discussions and sometimes do classroom activities as well. Therefore, you are expected to be on time for class, complete your readings before class, & prepare with questions and comments for classroom discussions. Students who miss class or assignments for the purpose of religious observance, job interview, or illness are permitted to make up course work for missed attendance. You are not excused for regular outside work or other ongoing commitments, class scheduling conflicts, having to cover for a workmate, regular sport practices, computer issues, or missing more than 10% of a scheduled class. Please email me through Canvas about your situation ahead of time or in a timely manner. In-class participation may involve sharing highlights from your written work during class, doing class-based activities, writing about food-related activities, learning about food cultures on campus. About 20%

2. Weekly Reading Review (RR). Write a short summary of your weekly readings and include a couple of questions for class discussion. These will be about 1-2 pages (250-500 words) and are due 2 days before each weekly class (except for Week 1). Summarize the main points of the weekly assigned readings. Include your reflection about the readings. Include a question or two that you have after reading the materials. Optionally connect relevant topics in the news with our lectures & readings. I look forward to reading these, so try to come up with some interesting thoughts and ideas! Do not turn in an outline, bullet point, or notational format. About 20%.

3. Midterm Assignment – Complete a United Nations Climate Change assignment concerning Food Systems. Details provided in class.

https://unccelearn.org/course/view.php?id=56&page=overviewLinks to an external site.  About 10%

4. Final paper. Your research paper will be based on an assigned question concerning a food, major ingredient, cuisine, or food cart experience. Details and guidance will be given in class. Research papers will be about 2,000-3,000 words (in ANSC 184) and 3,000-4,000 words (in INTL190). Your paper should be single spaced, with a cover header providing your paper title, your name; there will also be a body of text, tables, maps, figures, references, and any footnotes. Students will give a short PPT presentation about your research during the last few weeks of class. Research Paper is due 3/19 midnight (ANSC184) and 3/20 midnight (INTL190). Paper-based assignments, ~20% and final paper ~20%

SYLLABUS

Please read your assigned materials for a total of about 2-3 hours each week. If you can’t read every article within this time frame, please skim the article’s highlights until you get a good idea of the main points from the article abstract, section headings, first sentences of paragraphs, and conclusion. In addition, set aside some time to look at the media for each week. You can optionally include the media materials in your written Reading Reviews. Media in the syllabus are optional components and are available as examples for lecture and discussion.

Week 1 (Jan 8-12) Overview

Readings:

Colás, Alejandro et al. (eds). "Chapter 1" in Food, politics, and society: Social theory and the modern food system. Univ of California Press, 2018.

Srinivas, Tulasi. 2021. ‘‘Swiggy it!’’: Food Delivery, Gastro Geographies, and the Shifting Meaning of the Local in Pandemic India” Gastronomica vol.21, no.4, pp.17–30.

Media:

Watch a Video: Our Choices Matter  

Explore a website: https://www.usda.gov/topics/food-and-nutrition

Week 2 Jan 15-19 Food Collectors, Cultivators, & the Agricultural Revolution

Readings:

Fortier, Jana “Chapter 5” in: Kings of the Forest Univ. of Hawaii Press, 2012

Nabhan, Gary “Food, Health, and Native American Farming and Gathering” in Food Culture, Edited by Ron Scapp and Brian Seitz. New York: SUNY Press, 1998.

Mintz & Schlettwein-Gsell. "Food Patterns in Agrarian Societies: The Core-Fringe-Legume Hypothesis". Gastronomica 1.3 (2001): 40-52

Watch a video: •Agricultural Revolution - Brain POP or •The Birth of Farming

Explore a website: THE AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION: A GREAT MISTAKE?

Week 3 Jan 22-26 The Food Trade: From Regional to International 

Readings:

Colás, Alejandro et al. (eds). "Chapter 3" in Food, politics, and society: Social theory and the modern food system. Univ of California Press, 2018.

Nunn, Nathan and Nancy Qian. 2010. "The Columbian exchange: A history of disease, food, and ideas." Journal of Economic Perspectives 24: 163-188.

Spengler, Robert. Chapter 2 in Fruit from the Silk Road, 2019.

Watch a video: Food in Uzbekistan

Explore a website: Where your food originated

Week 4 Jan 29-Feb 2 Food, Alcohol, & Cultural Attitudes 

Readings:

Colás, Alejandro et al. (eds). "Chapter 4" in Food, politics, and society: Social theory and the modern food system. Univ of California Press, 2018.

Dietler, Michael. 2020. "Alcohol as embodied material culture." In Alcohol and Humans. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 115-129.

Looy, H., Dunkel, F.V. and Wood, J.R., 2014. “How then shall we eat? Insect-eating attitudes and sustainable foodways.” Agriculture and human values, 31(1), pp.131-141.

Media:

Watch a Video: A World of Food: Tastes & Taboos in Difference Cultures (log into UCSD library to see full film) 

Explore a website: Mrs. Balbir Singh: Indian Cookery

Week 5 Feb 5-9 Food in Public: Eating Out, Cooking Shows, & Public Culture

Readings:

Colás, Alejandro et al. (eds). "Chapter 6" in Food, politics, and society: Social theory and the modern food system. Univ of California Press, 2018.

Simi, Demi, and Jonathan Matusitz. "Glocalization of subway in India: How a US giant has adapted in the Asian subcontinent." Journal of Asian and African Studies 52.5 (2017): 573-585.

Tam, Andrew. "Singapore hawker centers: Origins, identity, authenticity, and distinction." Gastronomica17, no. 1 (2017): 44-55.

Optional: Kraig, Bruce, and Colleen Taylor Sen. "Commonalities and Convergences in World Street Market Food." in Food & Markets: Proceedings of the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery. Prospect Books, 2015. 

Media:

Watch a Video: Explore a website: Hawker Culture in Singapore

Explore a website: Mint Lounge’s Food section

Week 6 Feb 12-16 Food Security 

Midterm Assignment: Complete the UN class on Sustainable Diet at:https://unccelearn.org/course/view.php?id=56&page=overview.  Upload your Certificate of Completion for Midterm assignment credit.

Readings: 

Sachs, Jeffrey and Ban Ki-Moon. Chapter 10 ‘Food Security’. The Age of Sustainable Development. Columbia Univ Press

EAT-Lancet Commission “Brief for African Cities”.

Media:

UCSD Library Video (log-in first): Fishing: In the Sea of Greed  or a video about Lepcha farmers in Sikkim, Our Seeds, Central to Food, Life, and Culture

Explore a website: 

•Sustainable Development Goals ; •Global Food Security Index ; •Afghanistan’s Farmers, Herders desperate ; •Action Against Hunger   •Trade - a key ingredient to food security

Week 7  Feb 19-23 Gardening & Growing Food

(President’s Day Holiday 2/19)

Readings:

Taheri, Fatemeh, Hossein Azadi, and Marijke D’Haese. "A world without hunger: organic or GM crops?." Sustainability 9, no. 4 (2017): 580.

Ali, Abu Muhammad. "Homegardens in Smallholder Farming Systems: examples from Bangladesh." Human Ecology 33.2 (2005): 245-270.

Diekmann “Growing ‘good food’: urban gardens, culturally acceptable produce and food security”. Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems 35, no. 2 (2020): 169-181.

Optional: Watson “Project reports: Contribution of home gardens to in situ conservation of plant genetic resources in farming systems” *Choose 1 chapter to read in the Project Reports section - pp 42-148.

Media:

Watch a Video: Hunza People in Chipursan valley, Pakistan

Explore a website: Almost Heaven Farms or The Kamala Foundation: Regenerative Development in Nepal

Week 8 Feb 26-Mar 1 Slow Food, Terroir, & Identity-making

Readings:

Colás, Alejandro et al. (eds). "Chapter 8" in Food, politics, and society: Social theory and the modern food system. Univ of California Press, 2018.

Selibas, Dimitri 2021. “Buen Vivir: Colombia's philosophy for good living” Access the BBC Travel - https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210207-buen-vivir-colombias-philosophy-for-good-living

Kim, Sangkyun, and Chieko Iwashita. "Cooking identity and food tourism: The case of Japanese udon noodles." Tourism Recreation Research 41, no. 1 (2016): 89-100.

Media:

Explore a website: https://deccantiffin.co.uk

Explore a website: Asian Food Fest

Week 9  Mar 4-8 Food Commodities and Trade 

*No Reading Reviews this week. PPT Presenters should provide a link to an article on your PPT topic to share with your classmates

Reading:

Goody, Jack "Industrial Food: Towards the Development of a World Cuisine" in Food & Culture: A Reader.

Middha, Bhavna, and Tania Lewis. "Pop-up food provisioning as a sustainable third space: reshaping eating practices at an inner urban university." Australian geographer 52, no. 4 (2021): 407-424.

*PPT reading suggestions by your student peers

Media:

Watch a Video: •Evolution of the Food Industry  •Tea in the Land of Thunder

Explore a website: Marion Nestle's take on Food Supply Chains

Week 10 Mar 11-15 Promoting Health: Food as Medicine

*No Reading Reviews this week. PPT Presenters may provide a link to an article on your PPT topic to share with your classmates. 

Readings: 

Sarkar, Preetam, et al. "Traditional and Ayurvedic Foods of Indian origin." Journal of Ethnic Foods 2.3 (2015): 97-109.

Pempek, T.A. and Calvert, S.L., 2009. “Tipping the balance: use of advergames to promote consumption of nutritious foods and beverages by low-income African American children.” Archives of pediatrics & adolescent medicine, 163(7), pp.633-637.

*PPT reading suggestions by your student peers

Media:

Watch a Video: Unsupersize Me https://www.kanopy.com/en/ucsd/watch/video/156440 (log into UCSD library to watch)

Explore a website: The Eat Foundation

Congratulations on your navigation through our food studies course!

Your Final paper is due Weds Mar. 20, midnight. Remember to paste and format as a food blog on the Google Sites page. Leave yourself enough time to troubleshoot the formatting and polishing your blog format. Also, remember to submit your paper into your Canvas final paper assignment tab. 

Other Information

Written work is graded with attention to depth, breadth, clarity, creativity, and examples. In other words, given the parameters of written assignments, write with attention to appropriate depth of ideas for your topic, with appropriate breadth of points you can cover, and write with clarity of thought and grammar. Your writings should always aim for some lively creativity and showcase examples to highlight your topic or main points. Avoid unnecessary wordiness and spoken idioms.

Extra Credit You will need to ask me for extra credit & it will be offered under the Assignments tab. You may do these if you missed an WQ or other assignment. Using an assigned YouTube video for guidance, you can make a banana leaf plate, for example. 

Extra sites such as Google Drive, Google Sites, and Mendeley. We have a Google webpage site to share or store video or audio clips,  PDF articles, writing drafts etc. 

For editing, use: https://sites.google.com/d/1gO8k8PhjBctF9fO8ppWn0XYTREM_cWUl/p/1EdufcUZ9T_HNn49iPxrVUjQvmBWCk1ED/edit?authuser=4

For viewing only, use: https://sites.google.com/view/southasiafoodculture/home

Video: When watching films through the UCSD library, first turn on your computer device’s VPN (Virtual Private Network) connection to UCSD. Details are available at https://library.ucsd.edu/computing-and-technology/connect-from-off-campus/. You can then access by clicking on the video links in the UCSD library film and video webpage (http://roger.ucsd.edu/search~S3). Type in the name of the film/video or click on the video name in this syllabus. If you lose your VPN connection or the film stops, you can often “Reload” (Command+R) and this gives the video more time to download so you can pick up where you left off. 

Summary of Canvas Organization PDF articles are in Files; Past Zoom Lectures are in Media Gallery; Weekly Written Question and Final Paper are in Assignments; Discussions and group talks are in Discussions. Attendance will be entered by me in the gradesheet. The Pages folder contains optional material.

Summary of Grading 20pts/each session for attendance; 20pts for each for Reading Reviews; 250pts Research Paper, including the various components.

A/A- = 91-100%; B+/B/B- = 81-90%; C+/C/C- = 71-80%; D+/D/D- = 61-70%

Academic Integrity University regulations concern adding, dropping classes, exams, grading, unexcused absences, bullying, free speech, etc. In my class, students are expected to be courteous, avoid ad hominem attacks, use diplomacy, aim for logical arguments, avoid disruption, disrespect, exclusion, scapegoating, or harassment of others. Review of policies is available at https://catalog.ucsd.edu/academic-regulations.html, or at

https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/2710523/PACAOS-30. Students in this class have the right to expect that their fellow students are upholding the academic integrity of the University. You may ask other students to read and comment on your work and you may use sources such as Wikipedia and AI applications for insights. However, all writing and analysis should be your own work. Please recognize and cite all sources of data or information which can be compiled in footnotes or at the end of written paragraphs. If you are unsure of citation, please speak with me or read guidelines through library resources. If you are unsure what constitutes plagiarism, please see UCSD's academic honesty policy here: http://academicintegrity.ucsd.edu/ or confer with me. All cases of suspected plagiarism or cheating will be referred to the office of academic integrity. 

Submitting written work Students agree that by taking this course all required papers will be submitted for textual similarity and plagiarism review via Turnitin.com. All submitted papers will be included as source documents in the Turnitin.com reference database solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of such papers. Use of the Turnitin.com service is subject to the terms of use agreement posted on Canvas and the Turnitin.com site. 

Late assignments & make up exam policy Late assignments will be penalized 1% for every hour late. No assignments will be accepted more than 48 hours after the due date without an approved and documented excuse. There will be no make-up examinations without an approved and documented excuse. Acceptable excuses include illness, which must be documented by the UCSD health service or your physician, or a death or serious illness in the immediate family. I accept no other excuses aside from those recognized by standing University policy. Please notify me in writing of your need for an extension or make-up exam and I will put you in contact with the Department’s Student Advisor who has responsibility for the collection of documentation. 

Grade disputes If you believe that there is an error or oversight in grading your work you may petition the instructor to have your grade reviewed or changed. To do so you must submit a written memo of no more than 400 words explaining how an error was made and state the grade you believe that you deserve. Grade complaints are not considered beyond seven calendar days after the assignment has been returned to you. 

Students with Disabilities Students requesting accommodations for this course due to a disability must have a current Authorization for Accommodation (AFA) letter issued by the Office for Students with Disabilities (OSD: http://disabilities.ucsd.edu), which is now located on the 3rd Floor of Pepper Canyon Hall. AFA letters are now provided to Faculty electronically by OSD, per student request. Requests for accommodation must be made at least two weeks in advance of midterm exams. Contact Department Student Advising for further information. Student rights, responsibilities and administrative due process is also enumerated in campus policies. 

Image: Shutterstock

version 01/02/24 

Subject to modification