Educational alternatives in food production, knowledge and consumption: The public pedagogies of Growing Power and Tsyunhehkw^

Author/s: Pierre Walter

Edition: Volume 52, Number 3, November 2012

Summary: This paper examines how two sites of adult learning in the food movement create educational alternatives to the dominant U.S. food system. It further examines how these pedagogies challenge racialised, classed and gendered ideologies and practices in their aims, curricular content, and publically documented educational processes. The first case is Growing Power, an urban farm which embraces small scale capitalism and vocational education as an end toward community food security, social and ecological justice, and anti-racist education. The second case, Tsyunhehkw^, is the ‘integrated community food system’ of the Oneida Nation in rural Wisconsin, centred on cultural decolonisation through the growing and eating of traditional Oneida foods. In both these projects, there are strong possibilities to teach a critical, social justice alternative to white, middle class norms and practices of food production and consumption.

 Keywords: food pedagogy, Growing Power, Tsyunhehkw^, community, Oneida food, adult learning

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This article is part of AJAL, Volume 52_3. The entire volume is available in .pdf for purchase here.