[MPWG] CFP for SfAAs 2011: Social Dimensions of Plant and Mushroom Gathering in Urban Ecosystems

[Melissa Poe]

*Apologies for cross-posting...*



*Call For Proposal *

*for the Society for Applied Anthropology *

*2011 annual meetings in Seattle, WA*



*Proposed Session Title: Social Dimensions of Plant and Mushroom Gathering
in Urban Ecosystems*



Once antithetical to concepts of nature, *cities* are becoming recognized as
places of vital ecosystems, where dynamic processes regulate air and water
quality, and where greenspaces provide critical habitat for wildlife and
other organisms. Urban ecosystems also provide many useful products to
diverse socio-cultural groups (including items such as edible weeds,
mushrooms, wild berries and tree fruit) for food, medicine, materials, and
cultural expression. Gathering (also referred to as foraging, picking,
gleaning, harvesting, and collecting) plants and mushrooms is a nature
practice occurring in many cities worldwide, shaped by unique political
ecologies in those places.



We are organizing a panel session interdisciplinary social science that
examines social, spatial and institutional dimensions of gathering in urban
areas in North America and beyond. We hope to explore a variety of topics
related to urban gathering, including: informal and moral economies;
conceptualizations of urban nature and legitimate interactions therein;
access and equity issues across socio-culture diversity; urban food
sovereignty and urban forest management; environmental histories, property
regimes and land-use change; and the role of gathering in fostering
stewardship and people-plant connections in the city.



We seek submissions of case studies to promote a comparative case dialogue
in order to trace the connections between situated political ecologies and
to think constructively about ways that livelihood uses and cultural values
might be better included in urban planning and policies.



*Please send proposed papers, including title and abstract, to Melissa Poe (
mpoe at ifcae.org) by October 4th, 2010. Please distribute this CFP to relevant
professional networks.*

-- 
Melissa R. Poe, Ph.D.
Environmental Anthropologist
Institute for Culture and Ecology
www.ifcae.org
melissarpoe at gmail.com
ph. 206-473-7880
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.plantconservation.org/pipermail/mpwg_lists.plantconservation.org/attachments/20100917/39c3dcd2/attachment.html>