“Nutrition is not a discipline, it is an agenda.” This declaration, made by the French American nutrition scientist Jean Mayer has been adopted as the mission statement of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University in Massachusetts. As the title of the school indicates, it offers a program that is explicitly socially engaged, but the statement also demonstrates that the disciplinary status of nutrition as a university program is not a matter of consensus. This has long been the case. In the United Kingdom after the Second World War, for example, one nutrition scientist, John Yudkin, returning from his military service to a chair of physiology, set about constructing a university discipline and degree in nutrition, combining biochemical, physiological, and social scientific approaches. In response, Robert Garry, president of the British Nutrition Society, declared in 1953 that nutrition should be regarded not as a science or discipline but as a “meeting place of the sciences and of scientists.” Yet nutrition scientists interact not only with scientists but also with many others: professionals such as doctors and veterinarians, politicians, administrators, policymakers, representatives of funding bodies, industrialists, agriculturalists, campaigners, lay and alternative experts, and media representatives. They meet members of the general public and their families. And all those they meet eat and have views on nutrition.

Around the world and throughout history, one of the commonest subjects of everyday domestic discourse has been food, and food has likewise been a persistent topic in public and political discourse. Historically, this discourse has often been shaped by concern about hunger and food scarcity and insecurity. In more recent times, such concerns have been joined by worries about overabundance, overeating, and the seeming inscrutability of world food systems. During the last two centuries, these discourses have been increasingly shaped by the sciences of food and nutrition, as scientific and medical actors participated in public health, social welfare, and political policy debates surrounding food and diet. From the early days of the field, scientific nutritional knowledge became the basis for advertising copy and product innovation in the food and pharmaceutical industries. It was embraced by campaigners pursuing a wide variety of causes and by publics interested in maintaining and improving health.