University of Kentucky Political Ecology Working Group

Hello everyone! Our Seed Exchange is happening again this year. This is free and open to the public. You will be matched with a partner to exchange seeds. No need to own seeds yourself, you can purchase from seed banks or suggested seed stores on our webpage. Sign up by February 6, 2022!! Find out more: http://politicalecology.org/dopeseeds

We are so happy to announce the twelfth annual DOPE Conference will be March 24 - 26, 2022!! Mark your calendars now! This will be a hybrid conference. Stay tuned for more information in the fall!

If you attended any DOPE 11 events, please take our DOPE 11 Survey which will help us plan next year's conference: https://uky.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_3KMJxke7B9ncWuG.

image description: bordered by white sketches of dandelions on a green background, the white text reads, "Save the date, DOPE 12 Mar 24-26 2022. Hybrid. Participate in person and virtually."

The DOPE Collective is so excited to announce Dr. Reese’s Keynote talk title: “The Impossibility of Return: Movements through Crises and Care at the End of This World”. The 2021 Keynote will take place over Zoom February 20, 2021 from 5:30 pm - 7:00 pm ET. You can register by registering for the 2021 DOPE Conference at the link in our bio.

We are so excited to announce more about the Critical Restoration Geographies Reading Group!! This reading group take place during the DOPE 11 Conference, and be run by a Critical Restoration Collective working in mutualistic association with the DOPE Organizers. To find more information, please visit their part of our website: www.politicalecology.org/criticalrestoration. You can register for the group and the conference (for free) at the link in our bio. Here is a summary of what parts of restoration you are invited to examine with the collective and the structure:

Thank you to everyone who came to our first reading group meeting last week on Indigenous Food Sovereignty. Next month, we continue reading! Our readings for December focus on the topic of Black Foodways and Land Liberation. There is still time to sign up for our reading group, register for our conference, and send in a political ecology of food abstract to present in February! We are so excited for you to join us.

Our November meeting of the DOPE 11 Reading Group will kick off with these readings on Indigenous Food Sovereignty. There is still time to sign up for our reading group (at the registration link in our bio). We are so excited to see you soon!

We are thrilled to announce more information and the schedule of our DOPE 11 Monthly Reading Group (Nov - Feb). You can sign up for the reading group when you register for the DOPE Conference. More information can be found on our website and through the registration page!! Hope to see some of you November 19 at 5:30 pm EST!

Our DOPE 2021 Conference theme is Restore! Hope to see all of you over Zoom in February. Conference registration is now open in the link in our bio!

We are so happy to announce our Keynote Speaker for DOPE 2021: Dr. Ashanté M. Reese!

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Dr. Ashanté M. Reese earned a PhD in Anthropology from American University in 2015. She also holds a bachelors of arts in History with a minor in African American studies from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. Broadly speaking, Dr. Reese works at the intersection of critical food studies and Black geographies, examining the ways Black people produce and navigate food-related spaces and places in the context of anti-blackness. Animated by the question, who and what survives?, much of Dr. Reese’s work has focused on the everyday strategies Black people employ while navigating inequity. Her first book, Black Food Geographies: Race, Self-Reliance, and Food Access in Washington, D.C., takes up these themes through an ethnographic exploration of antiblackness and food access. Black Food Geographies won the 2020 Best Monograph Award from the Association for the Study of Food and Society and the 2020 Margaret Mead award from the American Anthropological Association and the Society for Applied Anthropology. Her second book, Black Food Matters: Racial Justice in the Wake of Food Justice, is a collection co-edited with Hanna Garth that explores the geographic, social, and cultural dimensions of food in Black life across the U.S. Currently, Dr. Reese is working on a new project that explores the continuity of plantation geographies and abolitionist possibilities within rural and urban food systems vis-à-vis the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s agribusiness sector. Her work has had appeal both within and outside of academia through her writing in outlets such as The Feminist Wire, Gravy Magazine, Civil Eats, The New York Times, Bloomsberg, and Epicurious, among others.

A letter from our organizers to our community: