8.11.2008

Cue "Eye of the Tiger": I can't give up yet!

So you can imagine how out-of-this-world-excited I was today when I saw that NYU had posted the booklist for my first Food Studies class. Because I’m soooo geeky that way.

- Of Frankenfoods and Golden Rice: Risks, Rewards, and Realities of Genetically Modified Foods by Frederick Buttel (Woo hoo!)

- Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West by William Cronon (Yeah, baby!)

- Agrarian Dreams: the Paradox of Organic Farming by Julie Guthman (Bring it on!)

- Sunset Limited: The Southern Pacific Railroad and the Development of the American West, 1850-1930 by Richard Orsi (Awesome!)

- American Agriculture in the Twentieth Century by Bruce L. Gardner (Fantastic!)

- Centrality of Agriculture: Between Humankind and the Rest of Nature by Colin A.M. Duncan (Okay, I paused here – it’s an $80 book. Whatever! I’ll use plastic!)

- Larding the Lean Earth by Richard Stoll (Rock on!)

- Dolly Mixtures: The Remaking of Genealogies by Sarah Duncan (Sheep? Cool!)

- Home Grown: The Case of Local Food in a Global Market by Bruce Halweil (Brilliant!)

So I bought everything on the list, except for American Ag in the 20th Century, which I checked out from the library. I clutched my card like a 5-year-old using it for the first time. I checked out the book. I took it back to my desk at work and cracked it open with enormous anticipation. Here is a sample of what I read:

The bearing of inequality on poverty is that, for a given income standard, or poverty line, and a given level of mean income of a group, the greater the inequality of income the larger the percentage of the group below the poverty level.

And I do not lie: The Whole Book Reads Like This. Don’t believe me? Let me randomly skip 100 pages ahead…Okay, here’s a sample from this page:

Although the sales and membership of cooperatives grew under the Capper-Volstead Act, it soon became evident that exemption from antitrust was not sufficient to confer decisive market power upon agricultural producers.

To quote Georgia Nicholson: Oh, what in fresh hell?

Eat, drink, and try not to second-guess your decisions.

1 comment:

INDYROSE said...

That's why it's always good to check things out! This summer I gave adult librarianship a go, and I disliked it immensely (I thought I would love it). I also decided to take up French again because I thought that I just might want to become a French teacher. I love the French (and will continue with it), but, as it turns out, I love children's librarianship best of all. Of course, boring books aside, you may find that this the perfect field for you. The more you try, the more you learn about yourself! Not to be corny or anything...