Each component of the global food system depends on a healthy planet. What is a healthy planet? It is not just the absence of air pollution, global warming, landfills, deforestation, oil spills, etc. A healthy planet, and therefore a healthy global food ecology (socially, politically, environmentally) also boils down to healthy dirt, nutrient-rich soil and water, microbial symbiosis… all sorts… Read more »
The time-lapse film showing seed germination, by Neil Bromhall, was my favorite video from this course. The short video is mesmerizing; it beautifully captures the precious beginning of various plant life as new sprouts emerge from the soil’s surface. I began gardening a year and a half ago. At the time, it was an unlikely hobby for me, but a… Read more »
Political Ecology has different levels of definitions depending on the scope of a given perspective. One concept that I find interesting is how we separate the word nature from environment. Essentially nature has a larger scope than that of what is implied by the word environment. Regardless of what word and what scope we have in mind about our surroundings,… Read more »
The political ecology of today’s world food system is continuously being shaped by countless influential factors. The world food system is in an utter state of imbalance in terms of waste and environmental degradation. The foundation from which these issues arise can be traced back to governmental and social dimensions and or decisions that took place in the recent past…. Read more »
I wish I spent more time in the dirt. I had spring-time dreams of generating enough greens to supplement my diet and quickly realized the many lessons of the soil I had yet to learn. The earth I put in my little garden is still new to me and I know it as living system which requires nurturing and nutrients…. Read more »
We all know and maybe even use some dirty words.Typically these expletives are used in reaction to pain or frustration, to emphasize a point. Then there is the crowd for which dirty words are such a natural part of the way they speak, they’re hardly aware the words have come out of their mouths. Odd as it may sound,t is… Read more »
Throughout the research process of writing my paper, I was overwhelmed with the amount of problems and lack of solutions that the people of Ecuador have in terms of water contamination. Ecuador has been involved in a resource curse, specifically around the mighty oil market. Their natural resources have been exploited by national corporations such as Chevron/Texaco since the 1980’s… Read more »
Fossil fuels are everywhere, even in our food. As we learned in week 6, oil is used to power the heavy machinery used on industrialized farms, it is in the fertilizer in the form of petroleum, it is in the plastics that are used to neatly package our food, and it is used to power the planes, trains and automobiles… Read more »
It turns out that soil is way more beautiful than we think and is even linked to issues of veganism. I realized how little I think about soil and what it is composed of- in fact, I didn’t even know exactly what soil is. It was just something that I took for granted. Thus, it was interesting in the lecture… Read more »
Kimmey, Katelin. Seed of a Soul. 2013. Photograph. Flickr.com8.15.2017 Seeds are resilient, when talking about gardening my brother once said, ‘I always just plant seeds and somehow almost every seed comes up and it amazes me every time’. Every year when little plants start to push their way through the dirt I remember his words. However, a seed can do… Read more »