Teaching Food as Media: A New Curriculum Connects Noodles, Culture, and Ecological Literacy

A summer publication from the Media Education Lab explores how food systems can serve as a lens for ecological education and media interpretation. The curriculum review highlights a course that uses noodles as a design motif to help students reflect on their personal and cultural relationships with food. The approach aims to address student anxiety and disconnection by fostering life-centered pedagogy and hope through food-related meaning-making.

The article highlights a summer issue of MediaEd Insights titled "What's for Dinner? Food as an Ecomedia Literacy Inquiry," which examines how food systems can serve as a gateway to ecological education. The curriculum review focuses on a course developed by Emory University professors Christine Ristaino and Hong Li, who incorporated noodles as a recurring design motif to help students examine their personal and cultural food histories.

The professors observed rising depression, anxiety, and food insecurity among students before and during the pandemic, prompting a pedagogical shift. Their life-centered approach uses food as a medium for meaning-making, aiming to foster hope and coping strategies. The course captures students' evolving relationships with food, often rooted in childhood experiences, as a pathway toward engagement and resilience.