“Whiteness and Farmers Markets” by Alison Alkon touches upon the subject of farmers markets not being as welcoming to people of color as they should be. I found it very interesting that the researchers chose to interview not only customers, managers, and vendors, but “tourists” as well. The people who don’t buy anything, what is their purpose for attending a farmer’s market? I appreciate the researchers' determination to find out different points of view from different kinds of people. By looking at this topic through the eyes of different people, new ideas can be brought to the table that can potentially improve the movement as a whole.
The article brings up the argument against popular slogans said in farmers markets such as “buy directly from the people who grow our food”. This slogan creates what the article refers to as a “white farm imaginary”. Which is the romanticization of smaller and independent farms (typically white owned or depicted as such). This just erases the reality of agriculturalism in the United States, only white people have had this glamorization of small scale agriculture. Many people of color’s efforts and contributions to agriculture in the U.S. are often overlooked. As mentioned in last week’s article, the same people who help produce our food can barely afford to eat it themselves.
If there was more appreciation for the people who have to suffer through being paid close to nothing and doing hard labor, I believe there would be more being done on a government level (with policies and such). The article also mentions how Hispanic people are rarely ever seen at these farmers markets. This is very strange, considering Hispanic people contribute a lot to the produce sold at farmers markets. To read the dialogue between the vendors and the buyers was jarring. The buyers are convinced that their businesses are entirely family run, and that everyone there works hard to provide produce. However, consumers remain unaware of the real people behind the food they are buying. A divide continues to be built between the people who produce and the people who act like they did. Sure this isn’t the case for every smaller farmer out there, but most of the farm advertisements I’ve seen have had white people as the face of them. More representation is needed, credit needs to be given where credit is due.
2 comments:
Part of the problem with this mentality of "white farm imagery" is where you are from. I live in a very rural area surrounded by farms. Every single farmer is white, with many being Amish. All of those farms reflect this "white farm imagery," because they and all of their employees are white. If this is all you have been exposed to, it is easy to generalize this. People in other areas may have those from other races within the area, which may make this situation incorrect. However, not all of "whiteness" is malicious. That may just be the population from the area. Of course, farmers' markets in a predominantly white area will cater to white people, as that is their customer base. They won't serve a bunch of ethnic food to those who may not be used to eating that.
I thought that it was a bit of a stretch to say that the European rural farm imagery was solely romanticism. Maybe it's adored because of the true beauty found in rural Europe? Maybe the attraction to it, as it should be around all farming, is the work ethic, there is nothing inherently wrong with working hard and not being noticed. But we as people have a desire to be appreciated, I highly doubt that the labor laws will adequately be able to address this issue. However, in regards to their being a divide between the consumers and vendors, I feel that laws dealing with the transparency of business actions would benefit us all.
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