Changing the Way America Farms: Knowledge and Community in the Sustainable Agriculture Movement - Book Review

Changing the Way America farms Knowledge and Community in the Sustainable Agriculture Movement Neva Hassanein 1999; 216 pp. $35 University of Nebraska Press

Much of the knowledge accrued in the sustainable agriculture movement has been the result of farmers--and their neighbors, colleagues, and allies--trading advice, techniques, and ideas about alternative farming and marketing strategies. Hassanein focuses on the regional networks that have evolved to meet farmers' needs for information not available from scientific reports, university extension services, and other traditional sources. She has done a valuable service in documenting the value of both informal networking and women's role in this process. This book is part of the University of Nebraska Press's "Our Sustainable Future" series, an important set of books designed to assist in the creation of a more permanent ecology-based future.

"Most farmers at the turn of the century did not see the development of scientific understanding of agriculture as the solution to their severe economic problems, whose source they believed lay instead with the exploitative tactics of railroads, bankers, farm implement industries, and others. Farmers' discontent found expression in populist organizations that strongly opposed the creation and funding of the agriculture research and extension system. They preferred their own educational programs through which farmers themselves developed and shared knowledge.

"Networks do not constitute a ready-made alternative to the dominant knowledge production for sustainable agriculture. They create conditions that potentially permit mutually beneficial dialogue between these different ways of knowledge so that the latter might inform each other better.

Farming Magazine People, Land and Community $18/year (4 issues). PO Box 85 Mt. Hope, OH 44660

Farming Magazine is one avenue for the kind of information exchange described in Changing the Way America Farms. Published in Mt. Hope, Ohio by David Kline and friends, Farming is mostly written by and for farmers seeking to "celebrate the joys of farming well and living well on a small and ecologically conscious scale." Advice about farming and the farm household; philosophical musings by Wendell Berry, Gene Logsdon, and others; a little anger; a little humor; all grounded in first-person experience. Hopeful reading even for the nonfarmers among us.

--MKS (recommended by Carolyn Raffensperger)

"It has been said that the true test of a sustainable agriculture will be whether we can romance our children into farming. In order for that to occur three things are crucial: 1. Our farms must be profitable, 2. We cannot be overwhelmed with work all the time, and 3. It must be fun. We at Farming Magazine believe in this wisdom.--DAVID KLINE

"Bananas are a great source of vitamins for your roses. Slice the peels and bury a few around each rosebush.--RL FROM VERMONT

"Our farm sits near a small town in a world made up mostly of small places--places affected by the policies of their governments but seldom consulted or considered. This place has been my "homeland" all my life, and my family's for eight generations. The government that now wants to talk about "homeland security," an obnoxious phrase, has been working at economically destroying our homeland for much of that time.--MARY BERRY SMITH

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