Food for Thought

As I am reading through some of the books and articles that I have gathered, many scholars claim that farming and gardening addresses the concern of ‘food politics.’ Food politics, for this blog’s sake, refers to the “ethical, political, and ideological concerns that affect food decisions by consumers” (Andrew Flachs). One thing that truly hit home for me, and has been a reoccurring theme in many of my readings, was the idea that a community garden reminds us that human beings are just another species on Earth. We are nothing special, just another complex, intricate, and beautiful piece of a bigger puzzle. Yet, often time the choices of food we buy display our unconscious awareness that what we eat represents our ethical decisions.

In my original proposal to the Mellon Summer Research committee, I wrote, “There have been numerous scholarly articles declaring this particular generation as the ‘me’ or egocentric generation—where the ‘I’ is of the upmost importance.”  Is it not true? As humans we always like to see ourselves as the ruler of the Earth, and due to this perception we feel empowered to do whatever we please.  An even greater dilemma is that we forget to reflect on a deeper level of our relationship with the natural world—especially those of us living in urban areas.

This egocentric view that we have of ourselves greatly affects how we act ethically and can arguably be the main reason why the concern for environmental sustainability have become so popular. We have forgotten the importance of preserving what is already there; instead we alter it to our pleasing. Thus, community gardening brings many people back to the realization that the environment, ‘what is out there,’ is a part of us. We are also out there.

In “The Agrarian Vision,” Paul Thompson reflected on a story Michael Pollan (a prominent author and food activist) discussed in one of his works, which talks about Cathedral Pines, a natural preserved in Cornwall, CT. In 1989, the park was completely destroyed by a violent storm, and the main debate was whether or not to restore the land to its ‘original’ state. Pollan sided with those who argued that they should do nothing, as he further stated that the Cathedral Pines was the “second-growth forest, replacing hardwoods that had been cleared by European settlers…” (Thompson).

That is a perfect example which depicts our impulse to modify our surroundings. What researchers and scholars have shown is that incorporating a community garden reminds us that we cannot control everything; instead, we should act so within our means. Gardens symbolize our relationship with the natural world around us, and that we need the environment more than it needs us. If we are craving for an apple, and it is not apple season—it is what it is. Nature tells us we should not go out of our way—because, as we come to realize, doing so leads us to destructive consequence. Of course, this viewpoint can be completely wrong, but is it not worth thinking about?

In solidarity,

Cindy

Works Cited

Flachs, Andrew. “Food for Thought: The Social Impact of Community Gardens in the Greater Cleveland Area.”Electronic Green Journal 1.30 (2010): 1-9. Web.

Thompson, Paul B., and Inc ebrary. The Agrarian Vision. Lexington, Ky.: University Press of Kentucky, 2010. Culture of the Land: A Series in the New Agrarianism Web.

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