“Access”: Rhetorical Cartographies of Food
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TROUBLING “ACCESS”: RHETORICAL CARTOGRAPHIES OF FOOD (IN)JUSTICE AND GENTRIFICATION by CONSTANCE GORDON B.A., San Francisco State University, 2011 M.A., University of Colorado Boulder, 2015 A thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Colorado in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Communication 2018 ii This dissertation entitled: Troubling “Access”: Rhetorical Cartographies of Food (In)Justice and Gentrification written by Constance Gordon has been approved for the Department of Communication Phaedra C. Pezzullo, Ph.D. (Committee Chair) Karen L. Ashcraft, Ph.D. Joe Bryan, Ph.D. Lisa A. Flores, Ph.D. Tiara R. Na’puti, Ph.D. Peter Simonson, Ph.D. Date The final copy of this dissertation has been examined by the signatories, and we find that both the content and form meet acceptable presentation standards of scholarly work in the above mentioned discipline. IRB Protocol #17-0431 iii Gordon, Constance (Ph.D., Communication) Troubling “Access”: Rhetorical Cartographies of Food (In)Justice and Gentrification Dissertation directed by Professor Phaedra C. Pezzullo ABSTRACT This dissertation explores the rhetorical and spatiotemporal relationships between food politics and gentrification in the contemporary U.S. developing city foodscape. Specifically, I explore a seemingly innocent, yet incredibly powerful key term for the food movement today: “access.” The concern over adequate food access for the food insecure has become a national conversation, as everyone from governments to corporations, non-profits to grassroots advocates, have organized interventions to bring healthy food to those most in need. In rapidly developing cities, however, these politics have become particularly complicated, as new food amenities often index or contribute to gentrification, including the displacement of the very people supposedly targeted for increased food access. Often mobilized through discursive frames of deficit—the “food desert,” the “nutritional wasteland,” the “unhealthy” body, or the “blighted” neighborhood—many food policy interventions discursively construct scarce space and, therefore, conclude the solution is that these spaces need to be filled with food amenities (stores, markets, and more). The trouble, however, is in articulations of food access, legacies of ecological, colonial, racial, and class-based inequity are smoothed over in favor of a future that may not include many long-time residents. Further, the voices of marginalized communities most impacted, too often, are ignored. My analysis traverses relations between national, municipal, and grassroots interventions, focusing more specifically on development and environmental (in)justice in northeast Denver, Colorado. I utilize mixed-methods—including textual analysis of food access maps, public policy, and media, as well as rhetorical field methods through iv participant observation and interviews—to trace discursive articulations of “access” and the imaginative politics of food systems change. Drawing on an interdisciplinary cultural studies perspective, my analysis is situated at the conjuncture in which U.S. food politics and gentrification collide. In addition to critiquing dominant food movement discourses, I also identify counterhegemonic organizing that resists food gentrification through constituting a relational, intersectional food justice movement. Their advocacy critically interrupts dominant discourses to organize around abundance, fosters fusion between issues and experiences of violence to hear a wider range of voices, and remaps the city in the hopes of creating a more just food future. v DEDICATION For the food insecure and the dispossessed. For those who nourish regenerative relationships and build community power in the face of exclusionary development and environmental injustice. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Mentors and teammates, colleagues and friends, organizers and artists—all of me is the result of those whose labor I cannot fully capture here. These acknowledgements will be incomplete, but you’re all on my mind. Neither the dissertation nor the doctorate was possible alone. Incredible gratitude must be shared with my advisor, Phaedra C. Pezzullo. You never made me feel out of place and helped my intellectual curiosities find their home(s). My scholarship and the completion of this document were made possible because of the time and support you offered in meetings, emails, edits, and over meals. Thank you for your advocacy, your care, and for always showing up. It is a privilege to learn from your example. From the MA to the PhD, Lisa Flores, Karen Ashcraft, and Pete Simonson helped me grow as a thinker and writer, offered challenging questions, and pushed me to dig deeper and strive for specificity. Both Tiara Na’puti and Joe Bryan affirmed my interdisciplinary musings and expanded the scope of my imagination. Each of you will inspire my scholarship and embodied politics for years to come. Thank you to numerous CU Boulder faculty who helped along the way: Jamie Skerski, Ted Striphas, Danika Medak-Saltzman, Veronica House, Jennifer Fluri, Daryl Maeda, Tim Kuhn, and Larry Frey. I would also like to acknowledge Villanova University’s Waterhouse Family Institute for the Study of Communication and Society for their support of this project. Thank you to my interlocutors, classmates, and those with whom I’ve shared food and conversation. Namely, my formal and informal writing/thinking partners as I completed this text: Stephanie Hartzell, Amani Husain, Kathryn Leslie, Josh Morrison, Deanne Grant, Logan Gomez, Elyse Janish, Lydia Reinig, Jim Miranda, Wayne Freeman, members of Jerry Hauser’s writing group, and a long list of critical, badass graduate students (at CU and elsewhere) who shaped my work over these last years. Thanks to those who offered feedback in courses, conferences, and workshops, and those who suggested books and articles to inform my thinking. I’m so appreciative of the transdisciplinary bonds that were built and the Department of Geography and Department of Ethnic Studies for their welcome. Special shout out to my co-author and friend, Katie Hunt, as well as Justin Eckstein who encouraged me to apply to Boulder in the first place. Importantly, this dissertation would not have been possible without the many residents, activists, and food practioners who shared their work with me. Specifically Candi CdeBaca, Asia Dorsey, Beverly Grant, Tony Pigford, Kayvan Khalatbari, Michelle Gabrieloff-Parish, Fatuma Emmad, Reuben Gregory, members of the Denver Sustainable Food Policy Council, and so many others who I’ve learned from at actions, teach-ins, and through social media. In addition, the friendship of Isaac Javier Rivera, Stephen Polk, and Joe Deras deserve recognition. Each helped me think critically about development, food politics, and environmental injustice in Denver and beyond. So much love for my family (both chosen and biological), who have been a consistent support system through the highs and lows of graduate school: Mary, Guy, and Will, Kara, Kelly, and Clara, Sweet Bean and (the late, great) Moose. Your presence and emotional support kept me grounded. Last, I have endless appreciation and humility for Kyle. Thank you for listening to me, reading (over and over) my words, offering critical feedback, and being a source of stability, conversation, and humor in my life. You’ve picked me up too many times and I am so grateful. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Introduction: Troubling Food “Access” in the Gentrifying City Communicating Food Systems 15 Food in Communication Studies 16 Articulating Food and Justice 21 Food and Environmental Justice 24 Food and (In)Justice 26 The Spatial Politics of Food 29 Foodways and Foodscapes 31 Gentrification and Racialized Green Space 36 Voice, Food, and Politics 46 Voice and Voicelessness 46 My Voice 49 “Access” as a Food Movement Key Term 53 Methodology: Conjunctures and Rhetorical Cartographies 57 Chapter Map 65 II. Maps, Metaphors, and the Infrastructures of Food “Access” 69 Contextualizing the Crisis of Food “Access” 77 Food Access Map 84 Iconic Codes and the Metaphors We Map By 91 Metaphors and Territorializing 93 Wor(l)ds, Maps, and Media 100 Mapping Scarcity in and Beyond the Atlas 106 Naturalizing Inequity 110 Pacifying Community 118 Conclusion 123 III. Articulating “World Class” Futures and the Impurity of Food Policy 128 From National Exigence to Municipal Interventions 136 Developing a “World Class” City on the Horizon: The Denver Food Vision 144 Foodscape Futures and Branding Urban Eco-Desires 154 Gentrification and Environmental Inequities 161 The Impure Politics of Food Policy 167 Polyvocality and Impurity 168 Disarticulation and Rearticulation 172 Temporal Tensions and Contestations 180 Conclusion 184 IV. Critically Interrupting Food “Access” by Organizing Around Abundance 189 Organizing Social Movements and Building Coalitional Relationships 195 Rejecting Scarcity and Organizing Around Abundance 206 “Gentrification is Not a Joke”: Agonistic Relations 207 “Connect Our Movements”: Building Fusion 219 “Relationships are Everything”: Remapping the City 228 viii “Reconnect with Place and Land”: Remembering Our Roots 241 Conclusion 246 V. Remapping Power and Planting New Seeds of Abundance 251 Revisiting “Access” and Maps of Power 255 Voicing Food Justice from Margin to Center 262 Spatio-Temporal Struggles and Food’s Politics 267 From Food “Access” to Accessing Power 270 VI. Bibliography 276 VII. Appendix 313 ix FIGURES