Tomasita meets TomatlTomasita meets Tomatl: Crossing Geopolitical, Ecological and Epistemological...
Transcript of Tomasita meets TomatlTomasita meets Tomatl: Crossing Geopolitical, Ecological and Epistemological...
Tomasita meets Tomatl:
Crossing Geopolitical, Ecological and Epistemological Borders on the Tomato Trail
Humanities Council SymposiumAppalachian State University
Deborah BarndtYork University
Song: Temagami Round
If we lose this forestIf we savage the landWe might as well be cutting off Our own right handFor we and the Earth are oneUnder the moon, under the sun
Stories
The truth about stories is that’s all we are.
……………………….
We need to be careful about the stories we tell.
Thomas King
My story: Post-war childhood in rural mid-west and Appalachia
Aboriginal and diasporic context
Toronto: most multicultural city in the world
���Peru 1976:���
PhD on Paulo Freire
Torn between three rolesð Pensadora:
Academic (critical social analysis)ð Politica:
Activist (collective political action)ð Poeta:
Artist (creative artistic expression)
Artist
Activist Academic
Embracing the tensions
Edward Said, postcolonial theorist
The general consensus that ‘true’ knowledge is fundamentally non-political (and conversely, that overtly political knowledge is not ‘true’ knowledge) obscures the highly organized political circumstances obtaining when knowledge is produced.
York University’s Faculty of Environmental Studies:���interdisciplinary, praxis-oriented, community engaged,
holistic and arts-based modes of inquiry and action
Popular Education Practice includes:
• Indigenous ways of knowing• Labour education • Feminist pedagogy• Anti-racism education• Development and global education• Queer pedagogy• Popular environmental education
Honouring the spirits of Myles Horton and dian marino
Honouring the spirits of Paulo Freire and bell hooks
Honouring the spirits of Augusto Boal and Jane Sapp
Related practices
• Radical adult education• Liberatory or emancipatory education • Anti-oppression education• Decolonizing education• Transformative learning• Cultural work• Theatre of the oppressed • Popular communications• Community arts
Community Arts Practice
A joint undergraduate certificate of the Faculty of Environmental Studies and the Faculty of Fine Arts
York University’s Eco Art and Media Festival www.yorku.ca/ecoart
Master’s in Environmental Studies���Examples of Student Arts-Based Projects
My epistemological approach���draws from these theoretical perspectives
• Marxist/structuralist: knowledge is constructed and ideological (Freire, Gramsci, Haraway)
• Feminist: knowledge is subjective and inductive (hooks, Mies, Hill Collins, Narayan, Alexander, Strega) • Postmodern: knowledge is fluid, subjective, and
representational (Foucault, Young, Loomba, Hall)• Difference-centred: knowledge is partial, multiple,
situated, & subjugated (Moosa-Mitha, , Spivak. Tuhiwai-Smith, Battiste)
Four Projects, Four Tangled Stories
1) TANGLED ROUTES: corporate food system2) FOODSHED PROJECT: digital stories feed local food movement3) MILAGROS FOR MIGRANTS: global within the local4) LEGACIES FILM: connecting Indigenous and non-Indigenous women farmers
Challenging western dualisms
• Theory/practice• Culture/nature• Science/art• Matter/spirit• Reason/emotion• Mind/body
Story One:���Tangled Routes
Women, Work and Globalization on the Tomato Trail
���The tomato ���as a code of globalization
The NAFTA Journey ���of the ���
Corporate Tomato
Builds on and reinforces ���north-south inequities
Tomasita��� vs. ���
Tomatl
Conflicting Cosmovisions: ���Reductionist vs. Regenerative
Weaving three theoretical threads
• Political economy (commodity chain analysis)
• Ecofeminism (social not cultural)
• Cultural studies (image imperialism)
Tangled Roots
Five moments in the history of global agriculture
The Scientific Moment and Colonialism 16th- 18th centuries
The Industrial Moment and Capitalism 19th-20th centuries
The Chemical Moment and Development 20th century
The Biotech Moment and Neoliberalism Late 20th century
The Computer Moment and Globalization Late 20th-21st centuries
Food Discourses and Approaches Eric Holt-Gimenez, Food First
"The Corporate Food Regime
Globalization from above
Interdisciplinary tomato
Production/Consumption: Distancing
Biodiversity/Cultural Diversity:���Uniformity and Homogenization
Work/Technology: Flexible Labour
Health/Environment: ���Ecological/Holistic Health
Globalization "from below
Interlocking analysis of power
Border Crossers:���Transnational
migrant labour
FOOD MOVEMENTS
The Other Globalization
IN MEXICO: El Campo No Aguanta Más (The Countryside Won’t Take It Any More)
Maize Movement: ���Defending Biodiversity from NAFTA Corn
Environmental and ���Human Rights Activists
Unitierra - ���Indigenous university
Zapatista movement
Mexican migrants take on Fast Food giants
IN THE UNITED STATES:���Coalition of Immokalee Workers
TRANSNATIONAL ALLIANCES ���Via Campesina���
Global Indigenous and Peasant Coalition
Collaborative and Individual Publications
Returning stories ���to their source
Story Two��� The Foodshed Project���
From collective critique of global food system to critical engagement in local food movement
Food Discourses and Approaches Eric Holt-Gimenez, Food First
Participatory action research with over 40 local food initiatives
Digital storytelling by students with local food groups
Organizational Ecology
The Stop Community
Food Centre
Opal’s Story: Envisioning Food Sovereignty
By Magda Olszanowski and Sara Udow
Training new farmers, cooks, and food activists
Generational Renewal
Malocca Garden @ York University
Growing Art, Rooted in Communities
FoodShare���School Salad Bars ���
Eat-In Ontario
Focus on Food: ���Youth food skills training���
Drawing on diasporic knowledges
Cultural Renewal
Local/Global gardens and farms
Seeds of our City
Telling Food, Eating Stories
Engaging a contradiction in our movement:
(…but don’t tell them that much local food has been grown and picked by global migrant labour….)
���Remittances as major source
of foreign exchange
Can local food be both sustainable and just?
Peach Farmer: I couldn’t survive without migrant workers
Anti-Racist Coalition: Good Food and Justice for All Initiative
Organizers of Migrant Workers: Justicia4Migrant Workers
Agricultural Workers Alliance (UFCW)
What contradictions exist in Boone’s local food movement?
Who picks the organic tomatoes you eat in Boone?
Reflexive Localism Dupuis, Harrison, Goodman
• Admits contradictions and complexity • Emphasizes process rather than vision • Doesn’t favour one scale of political practice • Works with multiple notions of privilege • Distinguishes between equality and charity • Strong memory of past inequalities • Doesn’t insist on shared values or world views • Embraces imperfect politics
���Story Three���
Milagros for Migrants:���An Immersive Installation ���
Honouring Ontario’s Migrant Farmworkers������
Deborah Barndt and Min Sook Lee
Appropriating Mexican home altars (Thanks to Amalia Mesa-Bains)
Unpacking Local/Global Food: ReFraming Labour
Seasonal Agricultural ���Workers Program
Connecting to deep history, cultural practices and resistance
NAFTA and remittances
Temporary Foreign Workers Program
Public awareness about migrant workers
Appropriating Prayer Cards as Critical Texts & Bookmarks
Multi-layered text: local/global, analysis/action
Appropriating corporate food labels as guerilla stickers
Global Food , G lob
alLabour
Global Food , G lob
alLabour
Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
alLabour
Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
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Global Food , G lob
alLabour
Global Food , G lob
alLabour
Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour
Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour
Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour
Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour Local Food,
Global Labour
Art for Migrant Worker Justice
Story Four:���Legacies of Tangled Routes:���
Film of Intergenerational and Intercultural ���Exchange of Knowledge
2003-2007: VIVA! Community Arts and Popular Education in the Americas
Theoretical Framework : ���Decolonizing art, education and research
Ongoing process of decolonization
Decolonizing as a Multi-faceted Process
• Acknowledging the history of colonialism
• Working to undo its effects• Striving to unlearn attitudes and
habits that perpetuate it• Challenging and transforming
institutional manifestations
2010: PhD thesis in Mi’gmaq ���and community defense in Listuguj, Quebec
2015: Revisiting Mexican tomato workers
2015: Revisiting Chiapas, ���Mexico
2015: Revisiting Nicaraguan Carribean Coast
2015: Revisiting Guna Yala in Panama
2015: It’s a new moment• Greater public consciousness about
food (Food Secure Canada, CAFS)• Greater awareness of Indigenous rights
and perspectives on the environment (Idle No More, Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women)• Greater openness to participatory arts-
based education and organizing
Legacies: Intergenerational Exchange ���at Six Nations
Intergenerational exchange of knowledge at Muskoka area farm���
Challenges of proposing the exchange
• Resistance to making work visible• Control of images and stories• Grant proposal categories are alienating• Want both structure and flexibility• Language barriers to intercultural
exchange
All Our Relations
Ecological: Interconnection of all living things Geopolitical: History of colonialism and oppression Epistemological: Ways of knowing grounded in body and spirit
Song: Temagami Round
If we lose this forestIf we savage the landWe might as well be cutting off Our own right handFor we and the Earth are oneUnder the moon, under the sun
Informed by feminist epistemologies and methodologies
• Intersectional analysis of power • Local historically contingent practices in global context • Situated knowledges and collaborative knowledge
production • Self-reflexivity re: internal power dynamics of project • Arts-based research methods challenge body/mind and reason/emotion dichotomies • Ecological analysis of interconnectedness feeding a more holistic popular education • Open to emergent questions and insights • Praxis-oriented in research and resulting political action