Food Geographies
The modern food system is increasingly complex and Food Geographies will allow you to understand this complexity through a geographical perspective. This system is guided by efficiency, safety, and profit; resultantly, consumers are continually faced with new choices. Global food production exceeds demand yet hunger and food insecurity persist. Viewing the world through the lens of food, this course will show you how food has shaped our physical and social worlds, the roads we drive on, the stores we shop at, the communities we live in, and the people we socialize with. Food can be used as a tool of political oppression to enslave farmers and dominate consumers, but it also has the capacity to be a tool of liberation and social change, evidenced by recent successes in urban agriculture and school lunch reform. Employing your geographical imagination, Food Geographies provides you with a fundamental understanding of the modern-day food system by investigating the history of food production, achievements and problems with the food system, and future solutions. Specifically, this course will introduce and familiarize you with how today’s food system came to be and why this matters; social and ecological consequences of food production and diffusion, including its relationship to climate and culture; emergence of alternative food geographies, such as food localism; redistributive mechanisms like emergency food entities (e.g. food banks and food pantries); theoretical discussions that engage the subject of food systems, such as political ecology; and practical solutions for improving the contemporary food system.