In the last speech you heard, was of Thomas Sankara. In it he asserts that: “Our country produces enough food to feed us all. In fact, we can produce more than enough. But because of the lack of organization. We still need to beg for food aid. This type of assistance is counterproductive. And has kept us thinking we are only beggars who need aid….I am asked where is imperialism. I say, look at your plate. You see the corn, rice... Imperialism is right here” According to Thomas Mitchell, in From Reconstruction to Deconstruction: Undermining Black Landownership, Political Independence and Community Through Partition Sales of Tenancies in Common, the story of the federal government’s failure to deliver “forty acres and a mule” to freed slaves after the Civil War has long been a part of African American folklore. This history has been highlighted in an opinion by a federal judge in a landmark settlement of the class action lawsuit filed by black farmers against the United States Department of Agriculture. The case is known as Pickford II. The original Pigford v. Glickman lawsuit, named after North Carolina farmer Timothy Pigford was filed against the USDA in 1997. The history of those African descendants who purchased land in states throughout the South during Reconstruction, however, remains largely unknown and uncelebrated. Research suggests that, in total, this group acquired approximately 15 million acres of land in the South in the 50 years following the Civil War. Further, unlike the large numbers of poor white men who were able to acquire land from the public domain under federal homestead laws in the late 1800s, African Americans who acquired land did so mostly by private market purchases, often under intentional and direct violence, limited access to credit, and overt discrimination. Furthermore, in relation to food security and insecurity issues, Margaret Marietta Ramírez in her article, The Elusive Inclusive: Black Food Geographies and Racialized Food Spaces, argues that “in recent years there has been a growing conversation amongst food scholars, activists and policymakers questioning the ability of community food projects to serve low-income communities of color (Alkon and Agyeman 2011; Allen 2010; Guthman 2008; Slocum 2006). Within these conversations, the issue of participation is often raised, framed as something that can be remedied by conducting “outreach” or building a more “inclusive” project that better engages local residents. However, it can be argued that these efforts for “inclusion” in community food projects will continue to struggle to build participation in communities of color if they do not shift the power structures that exist within the organization itself. Today, we will hear Dr. Monica White, who gave one of the keynote speeches at this year’s BUGS Conference which was held in Durham North Carolina, Oct. 19-21, 2018. Dr. Monica M. White earned her Ph.D. from Western Michigan University in Sociology. She is currently an assistant professor of Environmental Justice at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a joint appointment in the Gaylord Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and the Department of Community and Environmental Sociology. Her book, Freedom Farmers: Agricultural Resistance and the Black Freedom Movement, 1880-2010, was just released. Our show was produced today in solidarity with the Native/Indigenous, African, and Afro Descendant communities at Standing Rock; Venezuela; Cooperation Jackson in Jackson, Mississippi; Brazil; the Avalon Village in Detroit; Colombia; Kenya; Palestine; South Africa; and Ghana and other places who are fighting for the protection of our land for the benefit of all peoples! Links: https://www.blackurbangrowers.org/2018-bugs-conference Monica White: https://dces.wisc.edu/people/faculty/monica-white/ Freedom Farmers: Agricultural Resistance and the Black Freedom Movement, https://www.uncpress.org/book/9781469643694/freedom-farmers/