A new textbook entitled Geographies of Food: An introduction has been published by Mike Goodman from the Global Development Research Division and a series of co-authors from Universities of Hull (Lewis Holloway) Coventry (Moya Kneafsey) and Gloucester (Damian Maye). The book tackles numerous topics related to the role of food in global development, inequality and poverty and looks to propose, albeit with a critical eye, more sustainable solutions to the problems caused by industrial and other forms of farming, the global trade in foods and issues cause by food consumption and ill health. As Professor Jane Battersby from the African Centre for Cities at the University of Cape Town put it,
“Geographies of Food: An Introduction provides students and researchers with an excellent critical entry point to examine the extraordinary breadth and depth of research on connections between food and its geographies. The book address geographies of food at a range of scales, from global to individual and household and invites readers to think about how these scales connect. As a researcher from the Majority World, I particularly appreciated the book’s integration of materials and debates from both the Majority World and Minority World, and the efforts to place these within global geopolitics. The book is exceptionally readable and suitable as an introductory text for undergraduate student, but also for researchers wishing to broaden their knowledge of contemporary debates in food studies. The clear learning outcomes at the start of each chapter, the interesting and challenging activities embedded within the chapters and the further reading section at the end of each chapter make Geographies of Food: An Introduction an excellent text book that should stimulate student interest and critical engagement.”
Dr. Raj Patel, the author of Stuffed and Starved, The Value of Nothing and A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet stated the following:
“To study the food system is to pry open the modern world and lay bare its complex, messy and unjust relations of power and history. To do that, you need a textbook to be admirably clear, multi-disciplinary, global and unafraid to confront students with the most fraught and difficult controversies. This is such a guide, and it’s sure to become the definitive set text for any undergraduate food studies class, across the social sciences.”
The introductory chapter of the book can be found here
While the book can be order through Bloomsbury with a 35% discount here