Cooking Up the Past: Food & Foodways in the Ancient World

Catalog description

This course offers a survey of the foodways of the Ancient Near East, Egypt, Greece, and Rome as understood through a study of their literature, art, and archaeological remains, with an eye towards understanding their similarities and differences. We will focus on the role of food in understanding aspects of each culture, including farming practices, urbanization, food scarcity, transitions to agriculture, feasting and friendship, and foodways in religious ritual, funeral practices, politics, colonization, gender relations, and identity. Through weekly readings, discussion, and writing assignments, students will explore how assumptions, traditions, and experiences related to food can vary when examining cultures beyond their own. Offered as ANEE 242 and CLSC 242 . Counts as a Communication Intensive course. Counts as a Understanding Global Perspectives course.