Vegan Consciousness and the Commodity Chain: On the Neoliberal, Afrocentric, and Decolonial Politics of “Cruelty-Free” By Amie Louise Harper B.A. (Dartmouth College, Hanover) 1998 M.A. (Harvard University, Cambridge) 2007 Dissertation Submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy In Geography In the Office of Graduate Studies Of the University of California Davis Approved: ____________________________________ (Dr. Kimberly Nettles-Barcelon), Chair ____________________________________ (Dr. Wendy Ho) ____________________________________ (Dr. Psyche A. Williams-Forson) Committee in Charge 2013 -i- Acknowledgments There are many people I would like to thank who made the completion of this manuscript possible. My dissertation committee of Dr. Kimberly Nettles-Barcelon, Dr. Psyche A. Williams- Forson and Dr. Wendy Ho: Thank you for your comments and patience, as well as directing me towards the path of rigorous scholarship. My husband Oliver Zahn: Thank you for your years of support. My parents Patricia Harper and Bob Harper: When I was 12 years old, I told you that I wanted to get a PhD. You told me that there is no reason why this should not be possible. Thanks for the never-ending encouragement. My twin brother Talmadge Harper: Like mom and dad, you kept on telling me that I could do it. Sister Jayne Simon: Thank you for the endless conversations and being an amazing mentor and spiritual godmother to me. Tseday Worku: I appreciate the hours of ‘free’ child-care that you provided for my babies so I could complete this manuscript. Marian Swanzy-Parker: Our hours of dialogues about race, class, gender, and power were amazingly helpful and inspiring. Thank you for offering your brilliant thoughts to me throughout my dissertation journey. Dr. Deborah Elliott-Fisk: Thank you for always supporting and helping me figure out every step of my doctoral program. I very much appreciate you. Carrie Armstrong Ruport: Thank you for always answering my questions about everything, from figuring out PELP, to block grant funding, to going on filing fee. Dr. Stefano Varese: This dissertation came out of the final paper I wrote for you, back in Fall of 2007. Thank you for being able to see my vision at such an early stage, and supporting it with so much excitement. Tracey Buetow: Even though we knew each other briefly, I appreciate the time you spent taking care of Eva Luna so I could work on my introduction for this dissertation. Elke Zahn and Jochen Zahn: Thank you for flying out all the way from Germany to take care of the kids in 2012. This was a tremendous help. Melissa Danielle Haile, Dr. Tracy Robinson Wood, Bryant Terry, Tim Burt, Sheri Lucas. Dr. David J. Leonard, Thea Gold, Dr. Gwendoline Y. Fortune, and Dr. Chithra -ii- KarunaKaran: Writing about whiteness and racism in a “post-racial” era, can often be lonely and intimidating. Thank you for believing in my abilities to succeed as a scholar and activist, even when I had doubted myself at times. Dr. Lela Bachrach, Dr. Anna Harte, and Ofe: Thank you for orchestrating to take care of Eva Luna during the final stages of my dissertation revising. I am so glad Eva Luna and Ofe were such a great fit! Lauren Ornelas: I am so thankful to have met you as well as have been introduced to the Food Empowerment Project. Your work is my muse. I hope we can work together in the future! Dr. Katherine McKittrick: Thank you for publishing, in my opinion, the best book I have ever read on the subject of critical geographies of race. Demonic Grounds not only re- piqued my interests in the field of geography, it inspired me to matriculate into a geography doctoral program in 2007. Thanks for encouraging me to take black feminist and socio-spatial approaches to Sacred Woman. The way you ‘scale’ out the womb became the foundation of my analysis of Queen Afua’s work. VegFund, Lisa Shapiro, Well Fed World, University of California Davis Fellowship Office, Tofu Magazine, and Ryan Patey: Thank you for the fellowship and grant money. I thank all of the people who donated to my tuition, since 2011. I really appreciate such an investment in me, and how you were all confident enough to know that I would finish through. -iii- Amie Louise Harper March 2013 Geography Graduate Group Vegan Consciousness and the Commodity Chain: On the Neoliberal, Afrocentric, and Decolonial Politics of “Cruelty-Free” Abstract In this dissertation, I analyze how neoliberal whiteness, race consciousness, decolonization, and anti-racism operate within three different vegan food guides: PETA's Vegan Shopping Guide, Queen Afua’s Sacred Woman, and Food Empowerment Project’s Ethical Food Choices. PETA, Queen Afua, and Food Empowerment Project are all located within the landscape of vegan politics to produce “ethical” spaces across multiple scales (i.e. consciousness, the body and the home). However, these three sites represent different engagements with food commodities for achieving ethical consumption. Such differences are not so much about food, as much as they are about the social, political, and economic relationships underlying the food commodity chain. This manuscript will reveal that these ‘differing’ vegan guides, actually effect and are affected by whiteness; both in its historical (i.e. colonial whiteness and Jim Crow segregation) and contemporary forms (i.e. neoliberal whiteness). These connections will be revealed and articulated through the primary framework of critical race materialism and the lens of critical food studies. Chapter two is titled “’Never Be Silent’: On Trayvon Martin, PETA and the Packaging of Neoliberal Whiteness”. Vegan tomato products and So Delicious® are advocated as “cruelty-free” in PETA’s online Vegan Shopping Guide. I will engage critical race materialist and decolonial analysis of the meanings PETA has applied to these two commodities. Such analysis will reveal how PETA’s marketing of vegan products, as “cruelty-free,” conceals -iv- human exploitation that makes these foods possible. I also show how PETA’s ‘anti-racist’ use of Trayvon Martin’s 2012 murder for their new campaign, signify how both post-humanism and post-racialism work to conceal the violence of neoliberalism and racism. Chapter three is titled, “Feed a Wom[b]man, Feed the Black Nation: Afrocentric Vegan Politics and Queen Afua’s Kitchen.” Queen Afua is one of the most popular and widely read health activists amongst Black women in the USA. In this chapter, I analyze the food that Sacred Woman recommends or abhors to ‘purify’, ‘decolonize,’ and ‘liberate’ Black Americans from legacies of colonialism and racism. First, through an Afrocentric framework, I show how Afua’s vegan philosophy resists anti-black conceptualizations of Black women as “unfeminine” and “breeders.” After this analysis, I use Black feminist theorizing to explore how the meanings Afua places on particular vegan commodities simultaneously reproduces heterosexist, ableist, and black middle-class ‘reformist’ conceptualizations of a ‘healthy’ Black nation. Lastly chapter four is named “Food Empowerment Project and the Underside of Veganized Modernity.” Food Empowerment Project (FEP) is a pro-vegan food justice organization in South Bay California. They place great emphasis on farmworker rights and alleviating environmental racism. I show that their Ethical Food Choices guide exposes how neoliberalism, corporate-capitalist profits, and hyper-consumerism dictate “ethical” vegan marketing schemes and labels such as “sustainable,” “ethically sourced,” and “Fair Trade.” They achieve this by re-signifying the neoliberal meaning of ‘sustainable’ palm oil products and cocoa, to reflect the cruel and unethical conditions they create. Analysis of FEP’s boycott of popular ‘eco-conscious’ and ‘sustainable’ labeled vegan brands Earth Balance® and CLIF Bar® will be undertaken. -v- Ultimately, this dissertation articulates how something as `mundane' as vegan food guides can be used to create new critical literacies around ethical consumption and racial dynamics, as well as reveal how neoliberal whiteness operates within the food commodity chain. -vi- VEGAN CONSCIOUSNESS AND THE COMMODITY CHAIN: ON THE NEOLIBERAL, AFROCENTRIC, AND DECOLONIAL POLITICS OF “CRUELTY-FREE” CHAPTER ONE: VEGAN GUIDES: A CRITICAL RACE MATERIALIST APPROACH IN A NEOLIBERAL ERA .................................................................................................................................................... 1 WHY FOOD STUDIES? ................................................................................................................................................. 4 BRIEF OVERVIEW OF VEGANISM IN THE USA ............................................................................................................ 7 Brief Genealogy of Racial and Feminist Analysis in Veganism ......................................................................... 10 METHODOLOGIES ..................................................................................................................................................... 15 Racial Formation and Critical Studies of Race .................................................................................................. 15 Patricia Hill Collins and Black Feminist Theorizing ......................................................................................... 17 Critical Studies of Whiteness: Neoliberal and World-Systems Perspectives ..................................................... 19 CHAPTER SUMMARIES .............................................................................................................................................