How food programs reshape health and identity
The term "commod bod" is used with humor and affection. It also offers a critical way to describe bodies shaped by long-term reliance on U.S. federal commodity food programs.
In Commod Bods, Kasey Jernigan shares her ongoing collaborative research with Choctaw women and describes the ways that shifting patterns of participation in food and nutrition assistance programs (commodity foods) have shaped foodways; how these foodways are linked to bodies and health, particularly "obesity" and related conditions; and how foodways and bodies are intertwined with settler colonialism and experiences of structural violence, identity making, and heritage in the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.
Organized thematically, the book moves from a critical history of obesity and health in Indian Country to narratives of Choctaw women navigating food, memory, and belonging. Chapters such as "Food and Fellowship" and "Heritage, Embodied" center personal stories that show how food is not only sustenance but also a site of connection, resistance, and meaning making.
Food is critical to cultural survival and affirmation. For Choctaw people, the intentional demise of traditional foodways and dependence on federal food programs are specific experiences that inform part of what it means to be Choctaw today.

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Information
Publisher
University of Arizona PressYear
2026Print ISBN
9780816556212
9780816556229
eBook ISBN
9780816556236
Topic
Sciences socialesTable of contents
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: Illness in the Everyday
- 1. Historicizing, Politicizing, and Situating Obesity in the Choctaw Nation
- 2. Food and Fellowship: Intersections of Health, Violence, Trauma, and Indianness in Food-Centered Life Narratives
- 3. Historical Trauma, Contemporary Violence
- 4. Heritage, Embodied: A Space for Meaning-Making
- 5. Food, Foodways, Identity, Belonging, and Obesity
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
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Yes, you can access Commod Bods by Kasey Jernigan in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Sciences sociales & Nutrition, diététique et bariatrie. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.