Reclaim Your Harvest Season with A Decolonized Playlist for Hungry Ears

November 24, 2021 Real Food Real Stories

Line drawing portrait of Crystal Wahpepah with text set around the image that reads, “I knew what it would take and how long it would take, for me to become an Indigenous chef the way I wanted—to honor my grandparents and to honor my people.” — Illustration of Chef Crystal Wahpepah by Kaitlin Strange

As we gather in the kitchen and around the table this week, we’re reflecting on the ways food can nourish us on a much deeper level. Food can tether us to the stories of our communities and lineages, offer us a path towards healing and transformation, and nurture a reciprocal relationship with the lands and waters to which we belong. Of course, food can also root us in harmful narratives and practices of extraction, exploitation, and erasure. This harvest season, we’re sharing a bounty of stories that ground us in the former. Stories that gift us with a full-bellied experience of care and the love embedded in acts of accountability and reconciliation…

What is Cultural Strategy? And How To Seed, Feed & Feel Into A Worldview of Plenty

September 2, 2021 Nayantara Sen

What does it mean to transform our organization in service of deep, sustainable culture change? And what does it take to cultivate a worldview of plenty? These were the questions RFRS Director of Programs and Cultural Strategies, Nayantara Sen, brought to the table in an expansive conversation on abundance and cultural strategy with long-time friends, guides, collaborators and mentors Julie Quiroz of New Moon Collaborations and Tammy Johnson of TMJ Universe.

Our Around The Table series features informal conversations between RFRS community members with thought leaders, elders, organizers, and friends. Together, we take a deep dive––sinking our teeth into the juicy stories, live questions, and critical conversations buzzing in the food and culture space.

Platforming or Tokenizing? RFRS and White Supremacy in Food Spaces

June 23, 2021 Real Food Real Stories

Around The Table features informal conversations between RFRS community members with thought leaders, organizers, and friends in food about the juicy stories and critical conversations we’re chewing on.

The first post of the series, we’re excited to welcome 2021 RFRS Facilitator Cohort member, Stefani Renée Medley, in conversation with RFRS Executive Director, Jovida Ross. On a Tuesday afternoon in early June, Stefani and Jovida met up around the virtual table to talk tokenization and white supremacy in food spaces, and RFRS’s role and responsibility in shifting these dynamics.

Can Storytelling Transform Food Culture? An Evolving Purpose in a Year of Change

June 3, 2021 Jovida Ross

The last year has changed us. How could it not?

There are so many lessons from the pandemic: the inequities dramatically exposed and expanded, the ways it was viscerally clear how our health is intimately linked, both with each other’s health, and with the ecosystems we live in. The question is, what will we do with these lessons? As Sonya Renee Taylor reminds us: We are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment. One that fits all humanity and nature. Will we take the time to understand these lessons so we can pivot and meet the moment?