Organic Futures: Struggling for Sustainability on the Small Farm

Description

Part 1. Market. Making sense of organics : a brief history -- Organic hits mainstream -- Why supermarket organic matters -- Part 2. Land. Prelude : a sense of place -- Amid the chard : cultivating the diverse landscapes and practices of a New England organic farm -- Sea of brown bags and the organic label : organic marketing strategies in practice -- No-nonsense organic : negotiating everyday concerns about the environment, health, and the aesthetics of farming -- Conclusion : an alternative agriculture for our time -- Appendix : method and approach.;Walking through nearly any grocery store, American consumers will encounter organic food. At any of the myriad of farmers' markets that have sprung up across the United States, shoppers can expect to see claims about the provenance and farming practices employed to grow everything. But behind the scenes, scholarship has shown that organic farming increasingly resembles the industrial food system organic pioneers set out to challenge. Faced with the pressures of the modern economy many farmers have conventionalized, intensifying how they farm in the face of tremendous competition and cost. This work offers a glimpse into this world, through an ethnography of a small New England farm and the people who work in its fields. Part 1. Market. Making sense of organics : a brief history -- Organic hits mainstream -- Why supermarket organic matters -- Part 2. Land. Prelude : a sense of place -- Amid the chard : cultivating the diverse landscapes and practices of a New England organic farm -- Sea of brown bags and the organic label : organic marketing strategies in practice -- No-nonsense organic : negotiating everyday concerns about the environment, health, and the aesthetics of farming -- Conclusion : an alternative agriculture for our time -- Appendix : method and approach.