The Essential Work of Feeding Others: Connecting Food Labor in Public and Private Spaces

Food consumers have long been demanding a healthier and more ecologically sustainable food system. Yet labor is rarely part of the discussion. In this talk, Minkoff-Zern will draw on her co-authored new book, Will Work for Food: Labor Across the Food System , which chronicles labor across the food chain - from fields to processing plants, truck stops to grocery stores, warehouses to restaurants, and home kitchens to compost heaps. She will argue that improving labor standards and building solidarity among frontline workers is necessary for creating a more just food system. Using an intersectional approach to focus on the ways that inequities and patterns of exploitation for those engaging in paid food work are connected to unpaid home and volunteer-based labor, she will make the case for a feminist ethics of food related care. Food work as care work and care work as food work are a constant dialectic reminding us of the relationships between labor, gender and race relations, and social reproduction.

Speaker: Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern, Syracuse University