Copyright (c) 2009 All rights reserved. http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper Recent documents in Krista Harper, PhD en-us Thu, 12 Nov 2009 23:24:24 PST 3600 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/13 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/13 Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:59:45 PST Participatory visual methodologies open up new possibilities for community collaboration in the research process, appeal to diverse audiences, and produce rich visual and narrative data guided by participant interests and priorities. Presenting a recent research collaboration with a grassroots Romani (Gypsy) community organization in northern Hungary, I discuss ethical and epistemological questions raised in participatory visual research. In this project, our team used the PhotoVoice method to generate knowledge and documentation related to environment, health, and the lived experiences of social exclusion. I explore power relationships in the research process as well as historical and contemporary issues of documentary photography of the Roma in Hungary. Krista Harper Photovoice Hungary Eastern Europe Roma (Gypsies) Postsocialist societies http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/12 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/12 Fri, 16 Oct 2009 12:40:18 PDT The Budapest Chernobyl Day commemoration generated a creative outpouring of stories about parental responsibilities, scientific knowledge, environmental risks, and public participation. I examine the stories and performances elicited by the tenth anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in April 1996. In these "Chernobyl stories," activists criticized scientific and state paternalism while engaging in alternative practices of citizenship. The decade between the catastrophic explosion and its commemoration coincides with the development of the Hungarian environmental movement and the transformation from state socialism. Chernobyl Day 1996 consequently became an opportunity for activists to reflect upon how the meaning of citizenship and public participation had changed in those years as well. First, the Chernobyl explosion drew into question the authority of scientific expertise and Cold War notions of technological progress, provoking the "politicization of knowing" for many activists. Secondly, personal memories of the 1986 disaster reflect how Chernobyl presented everyday life dilemmas that caused many parents and professionals to see themselves as citizens and environmentalists, a process I term the "politicization of caring." I analyze the political implications of framing the environment as lifeworld, drawing from sociologist Ulrich Beck's concept of "anthropological shock." Krista Harper Hungary Environmentalism Eastern Europe Social movements Postsocialist societies http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/11 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/11 Fri, 16 Oct 2009 07:00:52 PDT Although postmodern philosophers proclaimed the death of the master narrative of enlightenment (Lyotard 1984), the environment has become a quintessentially global narrative. Throughout the world, people are imagining the environment as an object threatened by human action. Environmentalism proposes to organize and mobilize human action in order to protect the endangered environment (Milton 1995). Sociologist Klaus Eder posits that ecology has become a "masterframe," transforming the field of political debate (Eder 1996). The articles assembled in this special issue investigate the rise of the environment as a master narrative organizing political practices. Krista Harper Environmentalism Social movements http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/10 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/10 Fri, 24 Jul 2009 09:36:21 PDT Introduction In the late 1990s, Hungarian politicians, environmentalists, and agricultural lobbyists weighed the pros and cons of allowing genetically modified (GM) food and seeds to enter the Hungarian market. Starting around 1994, a small group of Hungarian environmentalists began researching GM issues. Initially, they feared that as a post-socialist country seeking foreign investment, Hungary would become prey to multinational corporations seeking an 'emerging market' with a lax regulatory environment. The terms of the debate were reframed over time, notably following 1998, when a number of European Union member states banned the imports of GM foods and when Hungarian expatriate geneticist Árpád Pusztai was caught in a high-profile media controversy after expressing misgivings about the health risks associated with GM foods. The Hungarian public, previously agnostic on the subject of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), was suddenly engrossed in a debate that came to draw upon two key symbols of contemporary Hungarian national identity: the figure of the scientist and that of the industrious peasant producing wholesome food. With Hungary's entry to the European Union, concerns about GMOs, food safety, and science and technology policy, have taken on an increasingly high profile in public debates about the European enlargement process. Krista Harper Hungary Environmentalism Eastern Europe Consumer society Social movements Food Policy Genetically modified organism (GMOs), Europe http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/9 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/9 Fri, 24 Jul 2009 09:20:23 PDT The development and pollution of two rivers, the Danube and Tisza, have been the site and subject of environmental protests and projects in Hungary since the late 1980s. Protests against the damming of the Danube rallied opposition to the state socialist government, drawing on discourses of national sovereignty and international environmentalism. The Tisza suffered a major environmental disaster in 2000, when a globally financed gold mine in Romania spilled thousands of tons of cyanide and other heavy metals into the river, sending a plume of pollution downriver into neighboring countries. In this article, I examine the symbolic ecologies that emerged in the two moments of environmental protest as well as Hungarian activists' reflections on the changing political ecology of the region in their discourses of "ecocolonialism" (ökógyarmatosítás) and "wild capitalism" (vadkapitaliszmus). Krista Harper Hungary Environmentalism Eastern Europe Social movements Water http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/8 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/8 Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:32:49 PDT In the springtime, fifth grade students at the Williamsburg Elementary School in rural Western Massachusetts ask to snack on sorrel and chives from the school garden, between planting potatoes and building a shade structure for their outdoor classroom. They are members of the first cohort of the curriculum-integrated program initiated by Fertile Ground, a grassroots organization in western Massachusetts. The children's delight in the fresh greens they have grown marks a national phenomenon: the farm-to-school movement. With limited resources, parents, teachers, students, administrators, and community activists are developing inroads to better school food and food education, by constructing school teaching gardens, visiting neighboring farms, engaging in classroom cooking projects and community harvest meals, and providing lasting farm and cafeteria procurement connections. This wave of national activism has arisen in response to the alarming diet-based childhood health crisis, and a desire for hands on experiences that connect young people to the land, food, history, their community - and themselves. During Spring 2008, Fertile Ground underwent a participatory evaluation project, in which fifth grade students assessed the value of inquiry-based, hands-on learning in the school garden through the Photovoice method. Photovoice research places cameras in the hands of community members so that they themselves document and discuss their concerns and perspectives (Wang, et al., 1996). The research was designed to gain insight about the students' knowledge of food, nutrition, and community food systems, having participated in six years of hands-on programming in the school garden. The research also aimed to illuminate the students' impressions of leadership, fellowship, care for the land and community that have arisen out of Fertile Ground farm-to-school programs. The Photovoice study was designed by Fertile Ground Director Catherine Sands, undergraduate anthropology intern Lee Ellen Reed, and Maggie Shar, Fertile Ground program coordinator and instructor. Professor Krista Harper supported the project with her expertise in research methods and with equipment from her newly established Photovoice Research Lab at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. This article outlines the context of school garden learning programs and its relevance today, delineates the methodology of our research, its assets and limitations, and offers an example of youth-driven, participatory Photovoice research and evaluation for farm-to-school programs. Catherine Sands Photovoice Environmentalism Food Policy http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/7 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/7 Fri, 10 Jul 2009 08:21:35 PDT Anthropologists and sociologists, from Levi-Strauss to Bourdieu, have observed that consuming food is a profoundly social act through which people express relationships and perform concepts of social order. Historically, food has provided a rich political symbol and rallying point, from the Boston Tea Party to the Sepoy Rebellion of 1857 in colonial India, when Muslim and Hindutroops rebelled against their British officers upon learning that their rifle cartridges were greased with suet and lard -- foods considered impure according to religious dietary taboos. Food features in Eastern Europe's history of politicalconflict; for example, the December 1980 Solidarity strikes in Poland were touched off by government announcements of Christmastime food shortages (Kubik 1995). Since 1989, food and daily provisioning has become the most immediate medium through which Eastern Europeans experience the vast political and economic shifts following the collapse of state socialism in their daily lives. Perhaps no other area of contemporary political action has as much to say about food as the international environmental movement. In the past decade, Greenpeace activists have battled McDonald's and Monsanto, the chemical agrobusiness giant. Grassroots environmentalgroups in Cuba, the U.S., Argentina, and Mexico have advanced the cause of organic agriculture. The Slow Food movement, which began in the mid-1980s as a neighborhood action against the construction of a McDonald's outlet at the Spanish Steps in Rome, went on to forge connections between gastronomical and ecological survival and has established chapters throughout the globe (Petrini 2003, Stille 2001). Food safety scares, from Alar-coated apples to mad cow disease, havespurred alliances between consumer advocacy groups and environmental organizations in North America and Western Europe (James 1993, Strydom 2002). How do environmental activists politicize foods, and how does this process differcross-culturally? Drawing from my ethnographic fieldwork among environmentalists in Hungary in 1995-97 and 2000, I explore political discourses on food, diet, and risk. Krista Harper Hungary Environmentalism http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/6 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/6 Wed, 08 Jul 2009 08:06:41 PDT In recent years, vibrant social movements have emerged across the world to fight for environmental justice -- for more equitable access to natural resources and environmental quality, including clean air and water. In seeking to build community rights to natural assets, these initiatives seek to advance simultaneously the goals of environmental protection and poverty reduction. This paper sketches the contours of struggles for environmental justice within and among countries, and illustrates with examples primarily drawn from countries of the global South and the former Soviet bloc.This working paper is also accessible at the folllowing URL:http://www.peri.umass.edu/236/hash/28d064d65f/publication/107/A newer, revised version of this article appears in the 2007 edited volume, Reclaiming Nature: Environmental Justice and Ecological Restoration, James Boyce, Sunita Narain, and Elizabeth Stanton, eds., pp. 326-48. Chicago: Anthem. Krista Harper Environmental justice Environmentalism Social movements http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/5 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/5 Tue, 07 Jul 2009 12:13:56 PDT This presentation applies sociologist Nancy Whittier's concept of "political generations" to explore political identities and strategies appearing over time in the Hungarian environmental movement. I discuss the rise of democratic environmentalism in the 1980s, the shift to a more professionalized and globally oriented activist stance in the 1990s, and the emergence of social justice frames associated with the newest cohort of environmental activists of the 2000s. Krista Harper Environmental justice Hungary Environmentalism Eastern Europe Social movements http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/4 http://works.bepress.com/krista_harper/4 Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:30:24 PDT "Wild Capitalism" examines environmental issues in the "New Europe" of the twenty-first century. Specifically, it looks at how the meanings of "civil society" and "environment" have changed as environmentalists encounter the political and ecological realities of life after state socialism. Although environmentalism is a global social movement, environmental politics is a grassroots process in which activists creatively translate environmental issues into cultural idioms and political processes. Krista Harper Hungary Environmentalism Eastern Europe Consumer society Social movements Postsocialist societies