College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences Theses and Dissertations

Graduation Date

7-2019

Document Type

Thesis

Department/Program Conferring Degree

Liberal Studies

Keywords

resilience, local food, food deserts, industrial farming, perennial polyculture

Abstract

Using resilience from the perspective of the two-book series on the subject by Brian Walker and David Salt, the following is an illustration of how the conventional food system, in the way its production is disconnected from the local environment and the people it serves, creates instability and uncertainty in that which we depend on for our survival. Following the discussion on the unstable nature of the industrial model and its impact on our well-being, is a portrait of an alternative approach for the cultivation of food based on people connected to the local ecosystem where in which fissures begin to shrink between earth and what it can provide to people in terms of food. Through following the argument for why we need to move away from the industrial model and toward a local approach, three local food models are presented that illustrate the eco-social principle upon which resilience is based. It is through these models that we can learn how to proliferate a local food community based on resilience in our country.

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