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Research Guides

History : Food: Books & eBooks

A research guide to primary and secondary sources for food history.

Selected eBooks in Food History

Food and Revolution: Fighting Hunger in Nicaragua, 1960-1993
Feeding the Future: School Lunch Programs as Global Social Policy
Why Food Matters
Diet for a Large Planet: Industrial Britain, Food Systems, and World Ecology
Famine Relief in Warlord China
Cookbook Politics
Every Nation Has Its Dish: Black Bodies and Black Food in Twentieth-century America
Red Meat Republic: A Hoof-to-Table History of How Beef Changed America
Branding Japanese Food: From Meibutsu to Washoku
Diners, Dudes, and Diets How Gender and Power Collide in Food Media and Culture
Oxford Handbook of Food History
Manoomin: The Story of Wild Rice in Michigan
Taste of Control: Food and the Filipino Colonial Mentality Under American Rule
Meals Matter: A Radical Economics through Gastronomy

Using UW Libraries Search to Find Books

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Find eBooks

You can find eBooks in two ways:

  • Do your search and then on the results screen, filter your results by using the toolbar:
    • Choose Availability: "Available Online" and Resource Type: "eBooks"
    • And then click on the green "Apply Filters" button
       
  • Use the Advanced Search option
    • Change "Show Only" to "UW Libraries" and "Material Type" to "eBooks"
       
  • See the eBook FAQ for more information

Search Tips

 

  • By Topic - Type in the keywords that broadly describe your topic. For example: chinese restaurants history
     
  • By Title - search for a specific book by title. Type in the first few words of the book title in quotations. For example: "chop suey usa"
     
  • By Author - search for books written by a specific author. Type in the last name followed by the first name of the author in quotations. For example: "freedman paul"

History eBook Collections

Use "Resource Type" option in UW Libraries Search to limit your search results to eBooks. Additional collections of eBooks can be found on eBook Collections guide. The following collections have strong history content:

Finding Books Beyond the UW

If you can't find the books you need at the UW or through our Summit partner libraries (Summit material can be found in UW Libraries Search), use the following catalogs. Books not available at the UW can be requested through Interlibrary Loan

Food Subject Headings

There are a number of subject headings used to find books in the UW Libraries about food history. In addition to broad terms such as food there are also narrower terms focused on a specific type of food (sugar, tea, chocolate, etc.). These are a selection of subject headings that may be useful when searching for books on food-related history. Use the terms in conjunction with the word history when searching for books. Many terms can also be used with place names. For example: 

  • chocolate history
  • food habits japan history
  • cookery american history

baking

baby foods

beverages

can foods

cookbooks

cooking 

cookery 

diet

dietaries

dinners and dining

food habits

food supply

foods

frozen foods

gastronomy

groceries

home economics

junk food

nutrition

restaurants

vegetarianism

Browsing Food History

The UW Libraries arranges books by Library of Congress call numbers. LGBTQ history and studies are primarily located under the following call number range.

S Agriculture Allen S. 1
TX 642-840 Cooking Allen S. 1
TX 901-953 Restaurants Allen S. 1


For a more specific breakdown of the call numbers see the Library of Congress Classification Online.