SOC GEN M136Eating Society: Science and Politics of Food from Individual to Planetary Health
Society and Genetics · 4 units · Undergraduate upper division (100-199)
(Same as Food Studies M136 and Sociology M136.) Questions of food and health are both individual and social. Students gain tools for understanding relationships between individual eaters, medicine, and social organization of food production and processing through set of research frameworks newly emergent in range of social and health sciences. Topics include individual and social ramifications of microbiome science; understanding how human gut microbes and health are shaped by pasteurization, processing, and food safety practices; One Health approaches that encompass human and animal health, discussing examples such as antibiotic resistance and emerging infectious disease as effects of large-scale agriculture; planetary health frameworks that link individual human metabolic health to issues of sustainable agriculture, for example how pesticides and fertilizers tie diets to environments; and resilience of cultural food systems in face of environmental pollution as issue of reproductive health.
Letter grading.
When it runs
Not on the schedule for any of Fall 2025 through Spring 2027. UCLA publishes only that window, so this does not mean the course is gone — check the official listing.
Requisites
UCLA lists no requisites for this course.
Requires
Everything that has to come before this course, not just the courses named in the requisite above.
Nothing — this is an entry point.
Unlocks
What this course is a requisite for, and what those courses lead to in turn.
No course in the catalog lists this as a requisite.