Happy April, everyone! Here is a uh kinda ridiculously lengthy post for you all… Note that I’m only asking you to read an additional two-page-long article, though, so it all evens out. :)
The main purpose of the Thursday discussion will be to get us grounded (ha), or rooted (haha), in who we are and where we’re coming from, in a few really specific ways, and in relation to larger systems of power. This post should provide an interesting framework for that. First, we’ll have a discussion about discussions, and about knowledge. Second, we have all probably heard about some of the many systemic injustices that pervade conventional agriculture and food production/consumption. Rather than focus on that, then, there is a brief article to read that offers a very broad overview of racism and capitalism in the contemporary food movement (towards the bottom of the post).
Why discuss discussion? Granted, our conversation last class was the first one of the quarter, but it’s interesting how disjointed it felt to me, jumping, for instance, from indigenous creation stories about corn to explanations of GMOs, without much of a bridge between the two–that is, without a common language accessable to all of us at once–without even a common starting point, for example a collectively-understood definition of GMO. While I hope we will have some common starting points in future discussions, the challenge of the conversation speaks to larger phenomena at play that I’d like to unpack.
Looking through the seed catalogs, I couldn’t find a reliable definition of GMO there either–it’s not just us, it’s that meanings of words are slippery, change over time, and change depending on context. Ask yourself: what field of study is the expert in who you trust to give you the correct definition? Ask someone else, and you may get a different answer. Different experts in different fields prioritize different questions, have different goals, and as a result, will get dramatically different answers. While there are definitely places and times to act on one’s intellectual and emotional knowledge, and to act with passion and conviction, there is no single “truth” we can ever really settle into. This is important. At the same time, I think there is a cultural romanticization of science, data, knowledge that purports to be exceptionally and undeniably factual. The scientific method should work such that research resulting in evidence-based theories doesn’t get treated like invulnerable Truth; culturally though, it frequently seems to. Then when scientific research is funded by corporate conglomerates, that makes the results all the more determined by the goals of the company (usually profit) rather than in pursuit of knowledge for humanitarian or other reasons. Anyway, all that is to say it’s not just a matter of two equally-valued different sorts of knowledge, but rather that some sorts are much more highly valued than others, on a societal level. Last class, I remember John stressing the need for exactly the sorts of open conversations that can be so difficult to engage in, given that we come to this interdisciplinary class from such different entrypoints. If we are willing to actively listen to ideas/knowledge that we may not understand and that may even make us uncomfortable, if we ask questions rather than just thinking of how to respond, I think our diversity of experience and knowledge can be a real strength.
Now I would like to offer some context for our differences in academic knowledge. My own learning experience has been firmly situated in the humanities–specifically in English–with AnSo, Poli Sci, and other courses here and there. I took one physics class, first year, and quickly realized it was not for me. At K, as in the world at large, it can be easy to get anchored in one discipline or body of knowledge, and to trust that as the most accurate, nuanced, or well-articulated worldview. It can feel good to be anchored. How I see the world is very much shaped by specific literary and cultural theories that deeply resonated with me when I learned about them in class. But there are limitations to any knowledge base.
What I find really fascinating here is that the very separation of the disciplines is a product– of history, politics, culture… Science and philosophy, math and religion, literature and visual art– none of these are intrinsically or naturally separate from each other. The categories we use to differentiate types of knowledge are themselves culturally constructed. This rings true at K: we can see its breakdown in certain cross-disciplinary SIPs, in the combination of Anthropology and Sociology into one (AnSo) department, in the interdisciplinary course requirements for many of the Concentrations offered, in the cross-listing of certain classes in the course catalog.
A number of scholars have pointed out that the apparent separateness of the academic disciplines is part of the phenomenon of Eurocentrism: the valuing of (Western) European ideas, cultural norms, etc. and its corrollary, the devaluing of ideas, cultural norms, etc. emerging from other peoples in other parts of the world (and too, I would guess, from marginalized communities in Europe). There is also the trend of taking the ideas, etc. that are valued in the Eurocentric model, from non-European peoples, and repackaging them to be presented as European. This is all, of course, set against the background of European imperialism and colonialism.
One manifestation of Eurocentrism in our own education is that–even given the examples of interdisciplinarity at K that I just mentioned–we generally take for granted this particular division of disciplines. We have come to see as “natural” or “universal” divisions of knowledge that actually have specific geographical, political, cultural roots in Europe. For late philosopher Georg Lukacs, “modern intellectual life is based on the analysis of the world into separate categories, and the discourse that develop around them cannot be reintegrated into a conception of a whole” (Hostettler, Nick, Eurocentrism: A Marxian Critical Realist Critique, 10). Some argue that even “the basic categories of modern discourse are contradictory;” so when we try to have a discussion from two standpoints, say, one based in theories of science and one in theories of art, that each side is coming to the table with such vastly different questions, language, and purposes, that their differences may be irreconcilable (Hostettler 10). Then there’s the concept of modernity. Closely tied to Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution Era emphasis on reason, science, quick economic and technological progress, the idea of the modern immediately (dis)places some communities back in time, relegating them in the (Eurocentric/mainstream) imaginary to a space of pre-history that does not offer useful knowledge in the present day, or to “humankind” at large.
Communities whose traditional knowledge/culture doesn’t fit neatly in (and hasn’t been totally subsumed into) the Eurocentric system of categorization, particularly communities of color, grapple with the effects of this and many other manifestations of white supremacy daily. One commonality among various groups of color though, seems to be the consistant devaluing (by those in positions of political, social, cultural power, and by the dominant culture as a whole,) of the knowledge within these communities, and a rejection of that knowledge (along with the people) as viable, valuable, useful, beautiful, good, or worth listening to.
I see what I’ve just laid out as a pretty key component of the backdrop for this class. The history of Eurocentrism does not go away but reverberates and haunts, even where it is not obvious, such as in the organization of disciplines and the ways we are implicitly taught to value knowledge. This is just one example of the ways in which systemic issues touch each of our lives at K College, to shape the way we think and feel and categorize the world. As much as I believe my time at K has taught me how to think critically, I can’t divorce that from the larger context. We are always implicated–in different, yet overlapping iterations–in the workings of complex systems of power as they move through time, space, bodies, institutions, discourse. I think we must be aware of this context in order to begin to think about the specific issues we’ll be getting into in this class: food justice, food sovereignty, local food, sustainable or regenerative growing practices, etc. etc.
In the following article, Eric Holt-Giménez glosses the global (and U.S.-focused) connections between capitalism, racism, food, and agriculture, placing emphasis on alternative food movements. He argues that “understanding why, where, and how racism manifests itself in the food system, recognizing it within our movement and our organizations and within ourselves, is not extra work for transforming our food system; it is the work” (Holt-Giménez 24). So please read the article, and keep in mind, just for yourself, where you might place yourself and the communities you are part of in the context of some of the systems/structures that Holt-Giménez brings up:
What might be called the mainstream alternative food/agriculture movement in the United States has been critiqued from many angles, though largely for being elitist: mostly white, upper middle class, and college educated. This critique is valid, though it is limited in its own ways. To give us some inter“generational” dialogue... Kacey, who took this class a year ago, pointed out in her comments on “Week 3 Discussion Hannah's Post” (posted to the class blog on April 8, 2015) something that resonates with Holt-Giménez. She wrote: “it is interesting that we focus on one conception of the food movement, the white one, because there have been historically, and are still today, so many powerful movements around issues of food access and food sovereignty within communities of color. I think the question is not why is the food movement white, but why are we only focusing on the white food movement?”
I think that in order to work through hard discussions, to answer Kacey’s question, and to work towards building just food systems, we must look inward, to our own experiences related not just to food but to larger systems of power, and we must look outward, to historical trends and cultural norms that play a part in shaping how we engage in the world.
Guiding Questions for Reflection (feel free to address any of these):
What has your academic experience at K been like? What sort of knowledge is comfortable to you and what do you struggle to understand or connect with?
Is it possible to build common knowledge and communicate with each other across disciplines, across experiences, across cultural differences, across histories? How might we (in our lil class) do this?
Besides the separation of academic disciplines, where else can you find traces (or way more than traces) of systemic racism (connected to all the other isms, of course) in your day-to-day life–at or outside of K College–and how might those impact the way that you interact with food systems, and with different types of knowledge?
