Welcome to Books of the Month, where once a month, we select works from our Bookshelf of authors within the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis. January is often a time for self-reflection and goal setting, so this month’s list features books that touch on both. 

If we could start all over again, what would our food system look like? What would we want it to look like? And can we make that dream a reality? These are some of the questions the Thinking Food at the Intersections: Justice and Critical Food Studies seeks to explore in "Imagining and Enacting Just Food Futures” on May 30 – 31. The colloquium will bring scholars, activists, artists and chefs together with students and community members for a sensory rich, immersive experience imagining the future of food. 

In her new book, "Real Food, Real Facts: Processed Food and the Politics of Knowledge," Charlotte Biltekoff explores friction between the U.S. public and food marketers when it comes to food processing.  She and others at UC Davis are making these types of conversations real and accessible to people both in and outside of the food industry. 

A team of UC Davis Humanities scholars planning a 2024-2025 seminar, Thinking Food @ the Intersections, was recently awarded $225,000 for the project. The seminar will have dual goals of understanding the complexities of food justice through a humanities framework as well as finding new potential solutions.