Syllabus

UNE Summer Session

SOC 275 Sociology of Food and Health – Summer 2025

Credits - 3

Description

Food is essential to human existence, and therefore is a central part of sociology. This course explores the relationships between what we eat, our health, and the health of society. What we eat as a society has social impacts, particularly on human and environmental health. We will use the “sociological imagination” to explore the following issues related to food:

First, we will begin by examining current Obesity trends and how government policy can impact the health status of a society. Then we will explore Food Justice, and discuss food insecurity and poverty as food issues related to our health. Next we will explore the role of Fast Food in culture, and how it influences individual eating choices. After a brief discussion of childhood marketing, we will then explore several environmental health issues. Finally, social movements related to food will be discussed as a mechanism for positive change locally and globally.

Materials

Learning Objectives and Outcomes

At the end of this course, students will be able to:

1. Employ a social science perspective, including associated assumptions, methods, and terminology, to articulate how culture, society, global processes, and diversity shape individuals, environments, and/or human relations across and within groups.
2. Demonstrate a sociological understanding of how our food system and the commercialization of childhood have created a public health crisis that includes food insecurity, obesity, and poverty.
3. Articulate, sociologically, the real costs of producing the food we eat to workers, animals, society, the environment, and consumers.
4. Explain what alternatives exist in our current food system, and what social movements are working to create food justice locally and globally.

Assignments

Discussions

Student Introductions

Student Introductions is the first discussion item. Please introduce yourselves to your peers. Be sure to respond to 2 other students. There is no word count minimum for this discussion.

Syllabus Acknowledgement Discussion Forum

Every student is required to participate in the Syllabus Acknowledgement discussion forum by starting an individual post stating that they understand and acknowledge the syllabus. There is no word count minimum for this discussion and no replies are needed.

Discussions and Participation

Discussions provide an active learning environment for you and your peers to master the content in this course. Discussions are a MUST in an online course for student-student, student-content & student-instructor interaction for active learning. There are two parts for a discussion – Initial Response to Discussion Question and Participation. Please note that unless you respond, you may not be able to see other responses from your peers to participate.

Initial Response to Discussion Question: Each week you will be required to respond to Discussion question(s) in a main post that is at minimum 200 words and at maximum 500 words. Students should not provide just a summary of the readings but support an interpretation or argument. However, these are not mere opinion pieces; you must use the reading assignments and any outside research you feel is appropriate to back up your stance. You must use at least one credible, peer-reviewed source to back up your stance. Sources such as Wiki’s, How.com and About.com are not acceptable and will result in a zero grade for your discussion post. Newspapers and news sites can be used to link a story to your work but are not considered scholarly sources in this course. Be sure that when you are posting any idea or statement that is not your own it is properly cited. 

Participation in Discussions: The minimum requirement for participation is 3 of each 7-day online academic week. This means to actively engage by substantively contributing or responding to your peers’ discussion posts in all weekly discussion threads. Substantive means comments that demonstrate comprehension and involve dialogue which uses critical thinking and extends the depth and/or breadth of discussions. ‘I agree’ or ‘disagree’ alone or similar statements will not be considered as a substantive response. Repetition and kudos are not considered substantive responses. Replies should add depth to the discussion and should not be used to correct or assess your peers. 

To meet the minimum requirements for each discussion assignment, including the student introductions, respond to AT LEAST TWO other student postings, plus any follow-up questions I ask. Keep in mind that proper APA format, and timeliness will also be part of the requirements for these discussions.

The minimum length for a quality response to another student should be 100 words, with a maximum being 250 words. Please keep in mind to be respectful to each other at ALL times. 

***INITIAL POSTS FOR ALL DISCUSSIONS ARE DUE ON THURSDAYS OF THE WEEK THEY ARE LISTED IN THE SYLLABUS AND RESPONSES ARE DUE BY SUNDAY OF THE SAME WEEK. ALL DEADLINES ARE 11:59 PM EST ON THE DAY DUE. ***

Assignments

Written assignments: Each paper should be turned in before or on the day it is due. A collegiate level paper should be Times New Roman 12 font, double-spaced, with a standard 1” margin on all sides. No abstract is needed. These papers should be written as a formal paper, cited, and using proper APA format, and requires detailed information linking what is written to what has been learned in class. Be sure that all sources used are credible, peer-reviewed sources that are properly cited and referenced in your work. Sources such as Wiki’s, How.com and About.com are not acceptable and will result in a grade of zero for your paper. Newspapers and news sites can be used to link a story to your work but are not considered scholarly sources in this course. “Fillers” and moral statements are not acceptable in a professional paper. Examples used in your paper must not be the same examples used in the text and / or in class; these examples must be from you and show your understanding of the material. Please make sure to proof-read your paper prior to submission. I will detract points for poor grammar and spelling. There should be no color added to this paper, a professional paper is in Black / White.

Assignment 1: In 1 full paragraph, using the assignment guidelines in the course and noted above, pick a specific topic that you will be analyzing throughout the term. As noted in the introduction video, you can choose any topic as long as it relates to the course/material in some way. If you are not sure about your topic, feel free to email the professor for guidance. This topic is the topic that you will be using for assignment 2 and the final paper. For this assignment, state what topic you have chosen and why. No sources needed for this assignment.

 

Assignment 2: In a minimum of 1 full page of actual written text/response, using the assignment guidelines in the course and in the syllabus, discuss the topic you chose. Why is this topic important? How does society impact this topic? How does this topic impact society?  For this assignment you will need a minimum of one lesson/textbook source and 1 outside scholarly source. Proper APA format is required.

Final Paper: In a minimum of 3 full pages, using the assignment guidelines in the course and in the syllabus, discuss the topic you chose. Spend one full paragraph summarizing the topic. Spend one paragraph reminding the reader why you chose this topic. After that, discuss how this topic has changed over time. Pick a sociological theory to apply to your topic. Which did you pick? Why? Discuss the impact this topic has on society and how society impacts this topic. How does this topic differ from country to country? If you could pick 3 ideas/concepts from this course to relate to your topic, what would they be? Why? Include 2 statistics from 2 different scholarly sources in your work. Four scholarly outside sources and a lesson/textbook source is required. Proper APA format is required. This page count does not include the title page and reference page.

Quizzes

This course includes 3 quizzes; all quizzes are timed and include multiple choice and True/False questions.

Grade Scale

Grade	Points Grade	Point Average (GPA)
A	94 – 100%	4.00
A-	90 – 93%	3.75
B+	87 – 89%	3.50
B	84 – 86%	3.00
B-	80 – 83%	2.75
C+	77 – 79%	2.50
C	74 – 76%	2.00
C-	70 – 73%	1.75
D	64 – 69%	1.00
F	00 – 63%	0.00

Grade Breakdown:

	Weight
Syllabus acknowledgment discussion	.5
Introduction discussion	1.5
Discussions (6)	24
Assignment 1	7.5
Assignment 2	17.5
Final paper	28
Quizzes (3)	21
Total	100