Food: Let's Keep Things Healthy and Traditional

Nicole Wojnowski

Prof. Melissa Santos

English 102-037

2 March 2018

                                        Food: Let's Keep Things Healthy and Traditional

          As discussed, this week in class, food and practices from generation to generation have changed over time. Ancestral practices such as singing and traditional recipes and practices are still done today, but is it really the same as it was back then? To find out, let’s take a look at what happened in Eating the Landscape by Enrique Salmon. During a class discussion, we got into our groups to discuss two quotes that were given to us and worked together to find what we thought these quotes meant and our thoughts about them.

            My group discussed the quote “Ease of acquisition of prepackaged foods outweigh access to ancestral and healthy foods.” on page 120. To this quote, my group responded with the idea that in modern times, we have lost connections with important practices that are crucial to sustaining a healthy environment and a healthy appetite for humans. This quote emphasizes the importance of keeping ancestral practices alive to keep us alive, like in Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. The chapter about the importance of strawberries to the storyteller and how they created fond memories can be comparable and contrastable to the quote from Eating the Landscape. “Us” meaning, we as humans all come from different backgrounds but back in earlier days where everything was done by hand, with gratefulness and trust in mother nature. Early groups, tribes, and villages allow us to have incite to the past that prove packaged food is not as great as it seems.

            It has come to the time where convenience and time and work-saving things are taking over what used to be done every day. People would rather buy from a grocery store rather than take time to garden or farm. Farming has become far less of a common interest. As seen in the short clip that we watched about the huge decline in farming practices, we are able to see that if we lose these practices at the rate they are disappearing at, we would eventually see only importing goods rather than farming ourselves.

          As a result of class discussions from this week, it opens ideas to those who thought that farming isn’t a declining industry and allows us to think about how we are moving further and further away from our ancestors, making us less connected with ourselves and our past. Are you doing something that could help keep farming alive? If not, see how you could get involved to help save these important factors to not only us, but nature too. As former President of SEA Club (Students for Environmental Awareness Club), it is important that everyone knows that taking more time to avoid processed and prepackaged expensive foods can help in the long run in several ways. Stay connected with your cultural ties and keep the traditions going.