Wild Rice Culture and Indigenous Food Sovereignty in North America

ended

The 370 million indigenous people in the world make up 5% of the total population, yet they constitute one third of the 900 million extremely poor rural people. Indigenous women are affected disproportionately by these hardships as they struggle to provide healthy food for their families. Indigenous peoples’ traditional food is a critical, yet deeply compromised, dimension of their culture, health and well-being. In Europe and around the world, food sovereignty is being embraced by scientists, social movements and some governments as a framework that can be used to realise more sustainable and just food systems. Food sovereignty, in the indigenous North American context, involves a re-connection to traditional land-based food and political systems. While an emergent body of research has begun to chart out indigenous food sovereignty, this is an embryonic field. This fellowship will focus on the hitherto under-examined gendered dynamics of access to natural resources in indigenous food sovereignty. Dr. Jessica Milgroom will analyse how the indigenous-led revitalisation of wild rice, a culturally important food for the Ojibwe people of the Upper Great Lakes area of the United States, has become an important strategy to assert control of natural resources and work towards food sovereignty. Using a feminist political ecology perspective, the project will explore the historical and current patterns of control of access to wild rice by Ojibwe people. The project will be hosted by the largest centre in the world focusing on food sovereignty and will be co-produced with indigenous communities using an innovative, transdisciplinary research approach that combines western and indigenous research methods. Dr. Milgroom will expand her experience in transdisciplinarity, her expertise in food sovereignty and feminist political ecology, and by leading a major research project will be well positioned to restart her career as a high-level researcher in Europe after a career break.