Food Studies

Overview

Our mission is to teach you how to examine the ways in which individuals, communities, and societies produce, distribute, and consume food. Given the University’s dynamic New York City location, your investigations of these topics will focus on cities as the center of flows of people, produce, and media products.

Students at the Food Studies MA program at New York University develop a range of skills, including:

• How to apply an interdisciplinary approach to understand the cultural, political, and economic aspects of the food system
• How to discuss with fluency issues related to food sovereignty, sustainability, ethics, and culture

• How to assess policies that shape the food landscape, addressing questions of equity and preserving cultural values

Careers and Outcomes

Graduates of the Food Studies MA find jobs in all areas within the food industry:

• Publishing (magazines, newspapers, online sources)
• Public relations (restaurants, food lobby groups, cookbooks, food organizations)
• Marketing (for restaurants, celebrity chefs, cookbooks, organizations)
• Nonprofit work (education, food/hunger advocacy groups)
• Food operations (wine importers/distributors, restaurants, retail)
• Local and national governmental (city government, federal government, food regulations, relations between industry and government)
• NGO work in advocacy and policy (farming, labor, food scarcity, trade)
• Development organizations (community building, national programs, international trade and aid organizations)
• Food production companies (producers and manufacturers of food items)
• Food distribution companies (importation, transportation, and retail)