Introduction

Throughout the ages, man’s efforts in producing, preparing and consuming food have shaped whole civilizations. Food cultures have undergone changes during war and famine and throughout periods of exploration, conquest, colonization and globalization. Over the past few decades, the study of food has burgeoned and expanded into research areas across almost every field of the social sciences and humanities. Increasingly, food studies courses are offered at universities and colleges, interrogating the inquiry of food in pedagogical contexts and disciplinary perspectives. New scholars to food history/studies are now greeted with an avalanche of journal articles and books dealing with topics as disparate as food commodity histories, food appropriation, food consumption in literature and film, school food, food security and food and animal rights.