About
Course
CCGL9041 – You, Food and the City: Local and global food networks
Spring 2014
This course aimed to engage students in a discussion about their relationship to food both as urban and global citizens. The course introduced central issues concerning networks of food supply, distribution and demand through a series of urban case studies, with a special focus on Hong Kong. The primary aim of the course is to increase students’ awareness and understanding of the local and global impacts of their everyday food choices. The course examined past and present local, regional, and international food networks and their environmental, cultural and physical effects. Tracking backward from consumption to distribution to production, the course introduced texts, graphic documentation, and case studies which explored, theorized, and explained contemporary discussions about food issues and sustainability, including environmental and health impacts, food security, urban agriculture and other initiatives to create a more sustainable, equitable and food secure future for the city.
Assignment
This website documents the cumulative, multi-part group project which was the primary assignment in the course. The project asked students to trace the path of a food product(s) backwards from consumption to distribution to production. In order to do this, students will worked in groups of two or three to research and document the processes and stages a food item goes through, starting with its purchase in Hong Kong through to its source(s), including outputs and inputs along its lifecycle (such as fuel, fertilizer, waste etc). The projects were presented as a short written essay (1000-1500) accompanied by photographic documentation, diagrams and maps.