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

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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

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Global Food , G lob

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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