While the word "diet" is simply a word to define the range of food that we eat, it has also come to be associated with a method of losing weight through restrictions, moderation, or deprivation of some type. Look no further than the latest diet programs that are advertised as an easy fix for an age old "problem." Where does this obsession with losing weight to reach some kind of idealized body type come from, and how has it changed over the millennia? From ancient world practices to 21st century crazes, it's time to uncover how the pursuit of healthy living has changed dramatically in societies throughout the ages.

Join New York Adventure Club as we trace the history diets and healthy eating in human societies throughout the world, with a focus on the most popular European and American crazes in the 19th and 20th centuries and their dubious advertising tactics.

Led by historian Lucy Jane Santos, our virtual experience surrounding the history of diets and healthy eating will include:

A discussion of popular diets throughout the ancient world, medieval period, and 20th century, some of which included tapeworms and appetite suppressants
The story of how a London undertaker managed to lose 50 pounds in a year and sold tens of thousands of pamphlets with his recommendations
How new understandings around food in the 20th century — like the identification of vitamins and scientific understandings of calories — changed the way that people eat
How an emphasis on food processing and “progress” led to manufactured items like white bread and canned fish becoming more popular
Some of the most ill-conceived and dangerous diets to have ever been developed, along with their disastrous side effects, which included the Master Cleanse and Sleeping Beauty diet
How ideas around healthy eating changed in the 1960s with an emphasis on organic foods and grains eventually leading to ideas of superfoods in the present day
The rise of regulated diets companies like Weight Watchers along with how governments have tried to regulate the industry to provide customers with safe and accurate information