I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this blog post, because there is so much to distill. The global food system is one of the densest, most complex subjects I’ve ever studied. I suppose the main thought I took away from this class is that there will need to be some massive overhauls and a much deeper and widespread… Read more »
My favorite contemplative practice was from Lesson 8, Soil and Water. I think about soil every day, believe it or not, from the small amount that gathers under my fingernails when I repot my flowers to the large swaths of it that make agriculture possible. When learning about the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway, I thought about what an… Read more »
Awareness key to understanding and grappling with a lot of the dense and complex issues surrounding the world food system. Many people make an effort to eat locally-produced sustainable meats and organic vegetables, generally avoiding beef that has racked up many “food miles” and genetically modified produce, because the alternatives are automatically “bad” or “unsustainable.” These kinds of hard line… Read more »
The common threads I found running through the concepts of hunger, food and energy, and climate change were feelings of both deep foreboding and indomitable hope. It’s really easy as a young person to focus on the main problems we are going to have to tackle with respect to these issues—how will we feed not only the starving people around… Read more »
For my Hungry Planet paper, I chose to compare the Ukita family of Japan and the Ayme family of Ecuador: “The Ukitas are a four-member family unit in a relatively small living space, which is common for Tokyo-dwellers. They spend roughly $320 per week on a variety of foods, including fish, fruits, rice, noodles, vegetables, oils, and several snacks. Sashimi… Read more »
Of all the contemplative practices we’ve done, the one that has stuck out to me the most is the one based on hunger. I’ve really only ever been dangerously hungry a few times, and usually it was out of negligence rather than a lack of food availability. That, in and of itself, speaks to the privilege I have of being… Read more »
Something I am now continually reminding myself about is the importance of context, and questioning how it all fits together. When you’re trying to determine whether something belongs in a system, you cannot simply think about it as a singular object. Rather, one must consider everything that connects—what flows in and out, how are different parts linked? Why are they… Read more »
Gathering my thoughts about our first lesson, I am amazed by how complex food actually is. After having read Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food, it’s surprising that even though there are things like the slow food movement and scores of people fighting for community gardens, the veil of nutritionism has not really lifted from the American psyche. Generally speaking,… Read more »