Master of Arts - Anthropology of Food with Intensive Language - African Languages (PGTF0228)

The MA Anthropology of Food with a 2-year intensive language pathway is directed at students who wish to combine knowledge of the anthropology of food with expertise in a regional language.

It prepares students to apply their anthropological knowledge in a specific region by achieving proficiency in a language. The MA programme in the Anthropology of Food offers students the opportunity to explore historically and culturally variable foodways, from foraging to industrial agriculture, from Europe and North America to Africa, Asia and South America.

Students will study the passage of food from plant to palate, and examine who benefits, and who suffers, from contemporary modes of food production, exchange, preparation, and consumption. Students will also explore the role of food in human migrations, the formation of regional and national cuisines, and food fears and food safety and concerns over ‘nutrition transition’.

Debates over the impact of agricultural biotechnology on agrarian livelihoods and knowledge systems, as well as on the natural environment, are assessed. Movements toward organic agriculture, veganism and vegetarianism, fair trade, and slow food are also analysed.

An anthropological approach to the study of food draws upon and challenges the perspectives of other disciplines, whether agronomy or nutritional science, economics or law, history or literature.