Farming While Black

by Leah Penniman

  Youth Food Bill of Rights

  by Rooted in Community

  We have the right to culturally affirming food. We demand the preservation, protection and reconstruction of traditional farming, cultural history and significance of food and agriculture. We demand that indigenous peoples have the right to establish their own autonomous food systems should they choose.

  We have the right to sustainable food. We demand an end to the mistreatment of animals and the environment, that is caused by our current food system.

  We have the right to nutritional education. We demand government funding to educate and inform youth and parents about nutrition. Education on things such as seasonal eating, organic farming, sustainability, and diet-related illness should be provided so that people can make better informed decisions. We recommend that schools recognize youth-led fitness programs as tools for success.

  We have the right to healthy food at school. We the youth demand more healthy food choices in our schools, and in schools all over the world. We want vending machines out of schools unless they have healthy choices. We need healthier school lunches that are implemented by schools with the ingredients decided on by the Youth. We demand composting in schools and in our neighborhoods.

  We have the right to genetic diversity and GMO-free food. We the youth, call for the Labeling of Genetically Modified seeds, plants, and produce. We demand a policy from the government that labels all GMOs.

  We have the right to poison-free food. We the youth absolutely don’t want any chemical pesticides in our food!

  We have the right to beverages and foods that don’t harm us. We the Youth demand a ban on High-Fructose Corn Syrup and other additives, and preservatives that are a detriment to our communities’ health. This must be implemented by our government, and governments around the world.

  We have the right to local food. We demand food to be grown and consumed by region to cut the use of fossil fuels and reduce the globalization of our food system.

  We have the right to fair food. We the youth demand that everyone working in the food system must be treated with respect, treated fairly, and earn, at the minimum, a just living wage. For all those who are working in the food system we demand a model like the Domestic Fair Trade Association to be implemented.

  We have the right to good food subsidies. We demand an end to the subsidy of cash crops, including corn and soybeans. Rather than our tax dollars going to subsidies for industrial farming, we demand financial support for small organic farmers.

  We have the right to organic food and organic farmers. We demand a restructuring of the process of being certified organic and fair trade to improve the thoroughness and accessibility of these programs.

  We have the right to cultivate unused land. We demand that a policy be enacted allowing for unused land to be made available for communities to farm and garden organically and sustainably.

  We have the right to save our seed. We believe farmers and all people should have the freedom to save their seed. Any law that prevents this should be reversed; no law shall ever be made to prevent seed saving.

  We have the right to an ozone layer. We the youth demand a 20% decrease of industrial farms every 5 years, to decrease the high levels of greenhouse gas emissions associated with industrial farming.

  We have the right to support our farmers through direct market transactions. We demand that the number of farmers markets be increased every year until there are more farmers markets than corporate super markets.

  We have the right to convenient food that is healthy. We want healthy options in corner stores while empowering the community to make better food choices. We demand more jobs for youth to work with our communities to make this happen and help them control their food systems.

  We have the right to leadership education. We the youth demand that there be more school assemblies to inform and empower more youth with the knowledge of food justice. The continuation of the movement for Food Justice, Food Sovereignty and cultivation of future leaders is necessary for feeding our youth, our nation, and our world.5

  Very early on in the piloting phase, the DA threatened to cancel the program after an incident where one of the youth stole an iPhone from an adult working on our farm. While the phone was found and returned, the DA was trapped in a “no-second-chances” mentality and wanted all of the youth in the program to be dismissed and returned to the traditional punishment system. We convinced them to give us a few days to demonstrate our techniques for accountability and justice. They reluctantly agreed. Unfortunately for our tenuous bargain, Sam,† the young person who stole the phone, did not show up to the program the next day. Our son, Emet, then nine years old, had formed a close bond with Sam and was devastated at his absence. The two had planned to make bows and arrows and play a game in the forest. Emet contacted Sam in tears and convinced him to return the next day. To the surprise of the DA staff, Sam did. We engaged him right away with “rock therapy,” a practice I learned at Many Hands Organic Farm, in Massachusetts. We gathered stones from the fields and threw them forcefully into the forest, while yelling and cursing loudly about the things that frustrated us—for example, “#%&@ my probation officer!” After letting off some steam, Sam apologized for his theft, signed a behavior contract, and completed the program with excellent focus and no further breaches of trust.

  One thing we must remember is that healing is an extended process during which patience is in order. Just as the Emancipation Proclamation did not erase the effects of 500 years of enslavement, so a few days of a restorative justice program cannot erase the emotional and spiritual impacts of inherited and lived trauma on the youth. All of our young people deserve to enjoy a sense of purpose, the acquisition of real skills, and the opportunity to contribute to the betterment of the community.

  Youth in Soul Fire Farm’s Project Growth are diverted from the criminal injustice system and given the choice to complete a training program on the land.

  Youth Food Justice Curriculum

  In collaboration with the thousands of youth who have blessed Soul Fire Farm with their footsteps, we have built a curriculum that connects learners with the land and advances their personal food sovereignty. Of course, the central “curriculum” of our youth programs is direct experience with the land herself. We spend most of our time together farming, cooking, chasing the dog, Rowe, and tasting edible wild plants. After eating the burrito lunch that we prepare together, we settle in for a few structured activities to overlay a conceptual understanding on our felt experiences from earlier in the day. The activities detailed in the rest of this chapter are a handful of our favorites. They were designed with and for teens, but are easily adaptable to younger and older audiences.

  Move Your Butt

  Overview: Participants learn the three components of food justice through an interactive, kinesthetic game.

  Time: 15–20 minutes.

  Materials: Benches or chairs in a circle.

  Activity

  Participants sit in a tight circle. The facilitator says “Move your butt if …” followed by a statement. If that’s true for a participant, they need to find a new seat across the circle. This is noncompetitive in that there are enough seats for everyone. The purpose is to notice how many people move.

  Round 1: Say, “Move your butt if …”

  You know someone who has diabetes.

  You know someone who has high blood pressure or heart disease.

  You know someone who struggles with obesity.

  Ask participants, “What do these three things have in common?” Let participants guess. Then share that diabetes, heart disease, and obesity are all diet-related illness. The first component of food justice is food security. Currently Black, Latinx, and Indigenous people are more likely to suffer from diet-related illness and hunger because of food apartheid. Access to affordable, healthy, culturally appropriate food is a basic human right.

  Round 2: Say, “Move your butt if …”

  You v
alue your cell phone.

  You value your friends.

  You value clean water.

  Ask participants, “What do these three things have in common?” Allow them to guess, letting them know that this one is trickier. Then share, “They all come from the earth.” Explain how each comes from the earth: Minerals and oil are mined for phones, natural filtration cleans our water, and humans are made of the food we consume. Ask, “How should we treat something that is the source of all we value?” The second component of food justice is about caring for the earth and leaving something for the next generation. Our ancestors knew how to farm sustainably; many of the techniques that are now called organic—like raised beds, intercropping, and natural pest management—were created by Black and Indigenous people.

  Round 3: “Move your butt if …” Remind participants that this last round is very personal and to remember to treat each person with dignity and respect throughout the process.

  Your ancestors were stolen from land or had land stolen from them.

  Your ancestors were enslaved or worked as sharecroppers.

  Your ancestors participated in stealing land from others or enslaving others.

  Talk about the history of genocide and land theft perpetrated against Native Americans; the enslavement, sharecropping, and land theft perpetrated against African Americans; and the forced migration and poor working conditions on farms perpetuated against Mexican and Asian Americans. The food system was built on stolen land and exploited labor, and this continues today. Over 80 percent of our food is grown by Latinx people while only 2 percent of farm managers are Latinx. African American farmers control around 1 percent of the farmland. The third component of food justice is equitable distribution of power and resources in the food system. People of color are working for our fair share of land, business ownership, representation in government, and wealth.

  The Black Child’s Pledge

  by Shirley Williams, published in The Black Panther newsletter, October 26, 1968

  I pledge allegiance to my Black people.

  I pledge to develop my mind and body to the greatest extent possible.

  I will learn all that I can in order to give my best to my people in their struggle for liberation.

  I will keep myself physically fit, building a strong body free from drugs and other substances that weaken me and make me less capable of protecting myself, my family, and my Black brothers and sisters.

  I will unselfishly share my knowledge and understanding with them in order to bring about change more quickly.

  I will discipline myself to direct my energies thoughtfully and constructively rather than wasting them in idle hatred.

  I will train myself never to hurt or allow others to harm my Black brothers and sisters for I recognize that we need every Black man, woman, and child to be physically, mentally and psychologically strong. These principles I pledge to practice daily and to teach them to others in order to unite my people.6

  Youth gather for opening circle and orientation at Soul Fire Farm. Photo by Neshima Vitale-Penniman.

  UPLIFT

  Black Panther Party Oakland Community School

  One of the demands of the Black Panther Party (BPP), founded in 1966 by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seal, was, “We want education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society. We want an education that teaches us our true history and our role in the present day society … We believe in an educational system that will give to our people a knowledge of the self. If you do not have knowledge of yourself and your position in the society and in the world, then you will have little chance to know anything else.”

  The BPP ran over 60 survival programs, ranging from daily free breakfast for 10,000 children, to health clinics, to schools. The BPP’s Oakland Community School opened in 1973, under the leadership of Erika Huggins and Donna Howell. With an enrollment of 160 students and a daunting waiting list, including the unborn, this school provided a culturally relevant education to its predominantly black pupils. The students studied traditional subjects—math, English, history, and science—but through a critical analytical lens. One alumna commented, “They taught us how to think, not what to think.” The students ate three hot meals daily in school, practiced meditation before afternoon classes, and ran their own discipline committee. The “Justice Committee” was a group of peers who listened to the student’s offense and issued them a consequence known as a “correction.” For example, the young students on the committee told a peer that because she didn’t do her homework, she would not get any free time. “You know we’re giving you this correction because we love you,” one of the young committee members told her.7

  Perhaps most important, the staff at OCS were predominantly Black, and those from other races went through training to expose and correct their implicit bias. Studies show that white teachers demonstrate negative bias in their grading of the work of Black students and in their predictions of student graduation rates and life success.8 In a phenomenon called the Pygmalion Effect, students internalize the expectations of their teachers and perform accordingly.

  While OCS closed in 1982, its legacy lives on. Colin Kaepernick, inspired by the work of the Erika Huggins and BPP, started a “know your rights” summer camp for Oakland youth. The curriculum is based on the 10-point platform of the Black Panther Party.9 The Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, with chapters in Atlanta, Jackson, Oakland, New York, Philadelphia, and DC, organizes Black youth and elders to know their history and “free the land.” Black Youth Project (BYP100) also carries on BPP values by convening young Black activists to work for economic, social, political, and educational freedom.

  Media Does Not Have My Mind

  Overview: Participants create short skits about healthy food and learn about the role of advertising in determining our diets.

  Time: 35–50 minutes.

  Materials: Projector, screen, audio, various props for skits, advertising facts.

  Preparation: Select two or three popular fast-food commercials, print out the facts.

  Activity

  Hold a brief opening discussion around these questions: What are your favorite foods? Who decides what you love to eat? Take a poll, “How many of you think that you decide what you like to eat?” At this point do not reveal anything about the role of advertising in influencing our diets.

  Watch two or three video clips of popular fast-food commercials. The activity works best if the commercials use a variety of strategies to engage the audience, for example celebrities, sex, fun, travel, popular music, “cool” teens, Black culture, and wealth. After each clip, ask the participants what strategies were used by the advertisers to get the attention of viewers.

  Pass out the following facts about fast-food advertising. Ask participants to read the facts out loud. These facts come from Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity’s publication, “Fast Food FACTS.”

  Preschoolers view 1,023 fast food ads per year, an average of 2.8 per day.

  Over $4.6 billion is spent each year to advertise fast food, compared with $116 million to advertise fruits and vegetables. That’s 40 times as much on fast food.

  African American children are targeted by junk-food advertisers, viewing 40 percent more calories daily in fast-food ads compared with white children.

  African American children and teens in the US are more than twice as likely to see an advertisement for candy and soda on TV as their white counterparts.10

  Come back to the initial question, “How many of you think you decide what you like to eat?” Encourage participants to consider external influences on their dietary choices.

  Ask the participants to break into small groups that each create their own health-food commercial in skit form. Give time to prepare, offer props, and encourage theatrics, singing, rhythm, and stunts. If participants need a little inspiration, show them the 2016 “Grow Food” music video, published on YouTube by the organization Appetite for Change. Challenge participants to
outdo the ads we viewed on the screen. Perform skits to one another with lots of snaps and claps.

  Young people use theater to explore the history of land loss and resistance in the Black community. Photo by Neshima Vitale-Penniman.

  Collage Biographies

  Overview: Participants develop a deeper understanding of people who have led the movements for food sovereignty by creating collages of these historical and contemporary leaders.

  Time: 40–60 minutes.

  Materials: Glue, scissors, magazines, cardstock paper, devices with internet access.

  Preparation: Research and print out information on selected leaders.

  Activity

  Ask participants to discuss the following quote by Howard Thurman: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs are people who have come alive.” Have participants share moments when they were doing work that made them feel alive. In this activity they will be honoring leaders in the movement for food sovereignty who work at the intersection of what the world needs and what makes them feel alive.

  Read off the list of names from which participants can select a leader to investigate. Each participant will create a visual collage about that person. Images and text should be combined on half-page cardstock and shared out to the group. The objective is to understand the strategies and victories of the farm activists who came before us. Below is a list of notable leaders, though any activists can be highlighted.

  Asha Carter, BYP100 member, presidential appointee in the Obama administration at the US Environmental Protection Agency