Uploaded July 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Food shapes our daily lives in profound ways, yet it's often taken for granted or misunderstood. In the course "Sociology of Food" at Texas Christian University, students learn how food functions as sustenance, commodity, and a sociocultural force. The course covers food from its starting point to its end — tracing its path as an agricultural product and a commodity to be traded, marketed, shopped for, prepared, and finally consumed. Edgar Jesus Campos, an assistant professor of sociology at TCU, says some of his students enroll in the course to better understand their own bodies and consumption patterns. While they gain that knowledge, they also leave with a deeper understanding of how global economic and political forces play into their personal diets.
Guest
Edgar Jesus Campos (https://addran.tcu.edu/view/edgar-campos) , assistant professor of sociology at Texas Christian University
For more on today’s episode, visit chronicle.com/collegematters (chronicle.com/podcast/college-matters-from-the-chronicle?utm_campaign=che-pcm-pd-ep-sn-food-for&utm_medium=aud&utm_source=mgp&utm_content=25-07-08-slnk-e035-l1) . We aim to make transcripts available within a day of an episode’s publication.
Food shapes our daily lives in profound ways, yet it's often taken for granted or misunderstood. In the course "Sociology of Food" at Texas Christian University, students learn how food functions as sustenance, commodity, and a sociocultural force. The course covers food from its starting point to its end — tracing its path as an agricultural product and a commodity to be traded, marketed, shopped for, prepared, and finally consumed. Edgar Jesus Campos, an assistant professor of sociology at TCU, says some of his students enroll in the course to better understand their own bodies and consumption patterns. While they gain that knowledge, they also leave with a deeper understanding of how global economic and political forces play into their personal diets.
Guest
Edgar Jesus Campos (https://addran.tcu.edu/view/edgar-campos) , assistant professor of sociology at Texas Christian University
For more on today’s episode, visit chronicle.com/collegematters (chronicle.com/podcast/college-matters-from-the-chronicle?utm_campaign=che-pcm-pd-ep-sn-food-for&utm_medium=aud&utm_source=mgp&utm_content=25-07-08-slnk-e035-l1) . We aim to make transcripts available within a day of an episode’s publication.
