Your central source for locating food-related courses taught at UMass Amherst.
Courses that are being offered in Spring 2013 appear in bold text.
Food Policy/Food Justice
These courses educate students about local, national and international decision-making that affects how food is produced, distributed, protected and consumed.
ANTHRO 397BP: Biology of Poverty
HISTORY 599: Food, Culture and Policy (also FC)
HONORS 292S: Hunger and Food Security
NUTRITN 597G: Nutrition and Food Policy
NUTRITN 578: Nutrition Problems in Developing Countries (also FN)
Malnutrition as it exists in developing countries and its socioeconomic background. Protein-energy malnutrition, famine, vitamin and mineral deficiency diseases, synergism between nutrition and infection, and the role of international agencies in fighting malnutrition. Prerequisite: NUTRITN 352 or consent of instructor.
NUTRITN 597K: Culture, Nutrition and Health (also FC)
How culture and ethnicity affect dietary practices and health in the U.S. Influence of food security, acculturation, and politics on food availability, food practices, and health outcomes. Health and health disparities in different cultural/ethnic groups, including overview of epigenetics. Emphasis on cross-cultural communication to address health and nutrition concerns.
PLNTSOILIN 185: Sustainable Living
PLNTSOILIN 290C: Land Use Policy and Agriculture in the U.S.
PLNTSOILIN 342: Pesticides, Environment and Public Policy
POLISCI 291F: The Politics of Food
PUBHLTH 302: Community Development in Health Education
This course provides students with the opportunity to explore approaches to community development and organizing. Students will gain skills and techniques to involve people in the analysis of the health problems that affect them. Students will also discuss potential solutions to community health problems. This course will incorporate new technologies as tools to examine local community health issues. Students will also be introduced to the principles and methods of community participatory research in local communities.
RES-ECON 121: Hunger in a Global Economy (also FC)
Explores the causes of hunger (chronic undernutrition) from an economic perspective. Focus on how population growth and economic development are increasing demand for food and on the prospects for food production to supply those needs at affordable prices, while sustaining the environment. Discussion in the context of the global economy in which increased trade links even the poorest urban and rural residents in developing countries to market forces. (Gen.Ed. SB, G)
RES-ECON 241: Introduction to Food Marketing and Economics
SOCIOL 329: Social Movements
Explores how and why social movements occur, what strategies they use, how they create collective identities, how issues such as civil rights, workers’ rights, women’s rights, the environment, the global economy mobilize activists’ participation within the circumstances faced.
STPEC 291K: Food Movements
WOMENSST 187: Gender, Sexuality, and Culture
Placing women’s experiences at the center of interpretation, this class introduces basic concepts and key areas of gender both historically and contemporaneously. It is an inter-disciplinary, trans-disciplinary, and cross cultural study of gender as well as an overview of theoretical perspectives of its intersection with other social constructs of difference (race/ethnicity, class, sexuality, and age). We will move beyond the theme of “gender difference” and examine the ongoing debate about the politics of gender inequality and inequity in our societies and cultures. Students will engage in critical reading and thinking about these interlocking systems which have shaped and influenced the historical, cultural, social, political, and economical contexts of our lives. Specific attention will be given to resistance of those gendered inequalities, and the various ways that social movements have created new systems of change by engaging in national and global transformational politics. (Gen.Ed. I, U)
WOMENSST 301: Theorizing Gender, Race, and Power
Ways of analyzing and reflecting on current issues and controversies in feminist thought within an international context sensitive to class, race, and sexual power concerns. Topics may include work and international economic development, violence against women, racism, class and poverty, heterosexism, the social construction of gender, race and sexuality, global feminism, women, nationalism and the state, reproductive issues, pornography and media representations of women.
Food Production/Food Processing/Food Safety
These courses provide students with basic knowledge about how food is grown and how it ends up on our tables, as well as factors that contribute to its safety (and/or lack of safety).
FOOD-SCI 101: Food and Health (also FN)
The role of food technology in meeting health needs. Topics include the development of new foods for the control of weight, reduction of risk in chronic diseases, and the utilization of food science to produce a varied, safe, healthy, and nutritionally sound diet. The possible alleviation of world hunger through technology.
FOOD-SCI 150: The Science of Food (also FN)
Biological and chemical principles underlying the maintenance of food quality during the period after harvest to consumption. Topics include chemical, enzymic, physical, and biological deterioration; implications and prevention; food toxicology. (Gen.Ed. BS)
FOOD-SCI 160: The Nature of Food (also FN)
An introduction to the scientific nature of everyday foodstuffs. Examines the chemical composition and physical structure of foods. Also examines the properties of food components which affect appearance, color, flavor, texture and nutritional value. Changes during storage, cooking and processing are considered for their effect on quality.
FOOD-SCI 590A: Food Science Policy (also FPJ)
FOOD-SCI 265: Survey of Food Science
HG-MGT 150: Food Production (also FN)
Basic principles of food fabrication and production. Topics include culinary terminology, product identification, quality standards, nutritional cooking, theory and application of food preparation techniques.
PLNTSOILIN 120: Organic Farming and Gardening
PLNTSOILIN 265: Sustainable Agriculture (also FPJ)
PLNTSOILIN 280: Herbs, Spices and Medicinal Plants
PLNTSOILIN 300: Deciduous Orchard Science
PLNTSOILIN 305: Small Fruit Production
PLNTSOILIN 325: Vegetable Crop Production
PLNTSOILIN 350: Soil and Crop Management
PLNTSOILIN 370: Tropical Agriculture (also FPJ)
PLNTSOILIN 397C: Community Food Systems
PLNTSOILIN 398P: Permaculture (also FPJ)
PLNTSOILIN 398E: Farm Enterprise Practicum (3-6 cr)
Food and Nutrition
These courses educate students about the relationship between food and health.
ANTHRO 313: Nutritional Anthropology (also FC)
No description is available at this time.
FOOD-SCI 102: World Food Habits (also FC)
NUTRITN 197A: Nutrition, Weight and Fitness
NUTRITN 130: Nutrition for a Healthy Lifestyle
Introduction to the science of human nutrition. Relationship of health to food intake. Description, digestion, absorption, metabolism, interactions and functions of nutrients. Nutrient and energy requirements of young adults, athletes, older individuals. Nutrient deficiency symptoms. Body weight control. Eating disorders. Vegetarianism, other dietary preferences. Planning adequate diets that fit life-styles. This course is generally not for Nutrition majors. (Gen.Ed. BS). Please see scheduling notes/restrictions for nutrition majors.
NUTRITN 230: Basic Nutrition
Basic principles of human nutrition. Energy needs. Chemical structures, physical characteristics, and metabolism of protein, carbohydrate, lipids, minerals, and vitamins. Human requirements at various ages. Food sources. Effects of deficiency or excess on health. Prerequisites: general biology and chemistry; organic chemistry concurrent.
NUTRITN 352: Life Cycle Nutrition
Nutritional needs and effects of intakes during pregnancy and lactation, infancy, preschool period, middle childhood, adolescence, adulthood and aging. Relation of nutrition to physical and physiological growth, development, maturation, and decline. Prerequisites: NUTRITN 230, biochemistry, physiology
NUTRITN 572: Community Nutrition
Skills and techniques needed to effectively carry out community nutrition programs and nutrition education, including knowledge of agencies and programs, community assessment, legislation, nutrition education, and working with people. Prerequisite: NUTRITN 352 or consent of instructor.
NUTRITN 577: Nutritional Problems in the U.S.
This class is designed to help you reflect and integrate what you have learned from your nutrition coursework as well as that from your Gen Ed courses and other experiences that have contributed to your development on the way to your final year at UMass. The goal of this course is for students to develop insight into the epidemiologic, physiologic, biochemical and nutritional complexities of major diet-related diseases in the United States. It satisfies the Integrated Experience requirement for BS-Nutrition majors.
NUTRITN 578: Nutritional Problems in the Developing World (also FPJ)
Malnutrition as it exists in developing countries and its socioeconomic background. Protein-energy malnutrition, famine, vitamin and mineral deficiency diseases, synergism between nutrition and infection, and the role of international agencies in fighting malnutrition. Prerequisite: NUTRITN 352 or consent of instructor.
Food and Culture
In these courses students learn about the role of food in shaping and sustaining human communities, and the use of food as a “lens” for understanding human history, cultural development, and individual identity.
ANTHRO 297F: Food and Culture
HT-MGT 191B: Culture and Cuisine
ITAL 597R: History of Italian Gastronomy
Taught in Italian and open to advanced undergraduate and graduate students.
The course provides an overview of the development of Italian cuisine and dominant taste from the Middle Ages to the late 19th century tracing the origins of modern Italian culinary tradition as we know it today. Through the analysis of original cookery manuals we will explore ingredients, recipes and menus of the medieval banquet and its importance as a social event, its transformation through the Renaissance and the culinary revolution of the 18th century, leading to the creation of the new cuisine of the upcoming middle class of modern times’ Italy.
JOURNAL 391J: Writing About Food
NUTRTN 597K: Culture, Nutrition and Health (also FPJ)
RES-ECON 343: Food Merchandising