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“A piercing ethnographic study of the power dynamics and misunderstandings that plague 'food justice' nonprofits."—Publishers Weekly
Breaks open the privilege and promise of food justice to envision a radical liberatory future.
Food justice activists have worked to increase access to healthy food in low-income communities of color across the United States. Yet despite their best intentions, they often perpetuate food access inequalities and racial stereotypes. Hanna Garth shows how the movement has been affected by misconceptions and assumptions about residents, as well as by unclear definitions of justice and what it means to be healthy. Focusing on broad structures and microlevel processes, Garth reveals how power dynamics shape social justice movements in particular ways.
Drawing on twelve years of ethnographic research, Garth examines what motivates people from more affluent, majority-white areas of the city to intervene in South Central Los Angeles. She argues that the concepts of "food justice" and "healthy food" operate as racially coded language, reinforcing the idea that health problems in low-income Black and Brown communities can be solved through individual behavior rather than structural change. Food Justice Undone explores the stakes of social justice and the possibility of multiracial coalitions working toward a better future.
"Food Justice Undone explores the stakes of social justice and the possibility of multiracial coalitions working toward a better future."
"The solution might not even be gardens and farms but, rather, innovative models for fair distribution."
"A piercing ethnographic study of the power dynamics and misunderstandings that plague 'food justice' nonprofits operating in Los Angeles’s predominantly Latino South Central neighborhood. . . . provides a nuanced window into mechanisms of power within lefty activism circles."
“Food Justice Undone . . . critique[s] the decentralized network of well-meaning outsiders bringing ‘interventions’ into South Central. Projects like teaching gardening or creating fresh food-finder apps might seem good on the surface, but they are not community-led; often, residents participate only for incentives like free produce.”
“Food Justice Undone is anthropology at its best: deeply contextual, rooted in both a complex web of theory and the lived realities of real people, and unwaveringly focused on the intersections of power and identities. . . . An enormously useful window into the radical contextualization necessary to study culture, especially to study culture with an eye toward advocacy.”
“At the end of her book, [Garth] argues that terms like 'food desert' have 'created a sense that there is a "crisis" that demands immediate intervention.' What if there isn’t?"
Contents
Organizations and People
Prologue
Introduction
Interlude 1: Journee
Chapter 1: History
Interlude 2: Wendy
Chapter 2: Justice
Interlude 3: Ms. Veronica
Chapter 3: Whiteness
Interlude 4: Kween
Chapter 4: Placemaking
Interlude 5: Ms. Bernetta
Chapter 5: Liberation
Conclusion: The End(s) of Food Justice
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index