This course is designed to introduce students to the practice and value of cultural studies through the examination of diverse representations of public health in the 20th and 21st century U.S. Our studies will focus on the production and distribution of food, workplace safety, environmental hazards and the promise of new biotechnologies. Particular attention will be paid to the workers who produce what the rest of us consume, the conditions under which they labor, and the environment in which they, their families, and those not employed by these industries live. Course readings encompass fiction, film, scholarly essays and investigative journalism. A course packet and these novels are required: Upton Sinclair, The Jungle; Ruth Ozeki, My Year of Meats; Ann Pancake, Strange As the Weather Has Been; and Octavia Butler, Dawn.