Teaching labor in food studies: challenging consumer-based approaches to social change through student research community partnerships

In this article we explore the results of a research collaboration between an undergraduate class focused on labor in the food system and the nonprofit organization, Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC) United. Students were trained as interviewers and collected surveys with restaurant workers in the upstate New York region as part of ROC United’s ongoing effort to eliminate the subminimum wage for tipped workers in New York State. We argue that this model of research partnerships with community based organizations is one crucial means by which Food Studies instructors can encourage students’ shift from a purely-consumer to worker perspective in the classroom and study of the US food system.