 The "Merriam-Webster Dictionary" defines Foodways as "the eating habits and culinary practices of a people, region, or historical period".The term ′foodways′ appears to have been coined in 1942 by three University of Chicago graduate students, John W. Bennett, Harvey L. Smith and Herbert Passim.In the 1920s and 1930s, agricultural scientists and rural sociologists, usually under the auspices of the United States Department of Agriculture, had undertaken various studies of food habits of the rural poor, with the aim of improving them.