Biocultural Approaches in the Society for the Anthropology of Food and Nutrition: A Reflection on 50 Years

ABSTRACT On the occasion of SAFN's 50th anniversary I reflect on the development of biocultural and human evolutionary approaches to human diet and nutrition. I maintain that SAFN and its predecessors the Committee (1974–1987) and then Council on Nutritional Anthropology (1987–2004) have modeled, fostered, and advanced biocultural work in anthropology in a way that is unique within the broader field of anthropology. At the risk of being trite, the phrase “you are what you eat” captures the reasons why the study of diet is so amenable to this holistic approach. It speaks to aspects of humanity that are universal, or species‐wide (e.g., nutrient requirements) and those that are highly variable across populations and cultures (e.g., foodways). Here I highlight the key topics, approaches, and theoretical stances that have influenced my own biocultural research and engagement with SAFN over the past 30+ years and consider the status of nutritional anthropology within the scope of contemporary anthropology, especially in human evolutionary studies.