Date of Award

2017

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Brain, David

Area of Concentration

Environmental Studies

Abstract

By examining how the broader trends of our current globalized industrial food system take shape in the city of Ithaca, New York and its surrounding agricultural hinterland, this thesis explores the transformative potential for local agricultural movements to reconnect people to place. Through interviews and participatory observation, this project examines the role of the community in local agriculture, the policies and organizations critical to fostering and sustaining this local food network, and the way in which consumer and producer values can work in conjunction for mutual benefits or conflict for divergent needs. Driving my research is an investigation into how different community networks act to support local farmers, allowing for an alternative system that works around the obstacles of the modern agribusiness industry; as well as a question of limitations to these solutions, given the growing impacts of climate change on the local environment. Within the sustainability discourse, this thesis recognizes food as both a symptom and a symbol of how we organize ourselves as a society in the modern age.

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