Navigating the Enigma of Nourishment in 'America'
Contemplating my association with sustenance, my initial musings delve into the realm of trauma. The relentless societal insistence on a svelte physique instigated a lifelong struggle with disordered eating at a tender age of 8. Subsequently, I grappled with severe chronic pain and autoimmune afflictions exacerbated by the consumption of gluten, soy, and dairy. A diagnosis of diabetes in my early thirties plunged me into months of stringent dietary constraints that took a toll on my well-being.
The tapestry of my adult years is woven with threads of food insecurity—be it due to financial constraints or the challenges of procuring and preparing meals without assistance. The indelible imprint of standing in a grocery store, body aflame with pain, meticulously tallying every penny of my grocery expenses, haunts my psyche. The inadequacy of EBT funds for survival intensifies the stress and humiliation of the experience.
The act of eating has transformed into a labyrinthine process, entwined with fear, burdens, and sporadic moments of joy. The maxim "the personal is political" resonates profoundly with me, as my gastronomic experiences, though deeply personal, bear the weight of political implications. The roots of my alimentary challenges extend back centuries to the colonialist practices that disrupted Indigenous food sources, despoiled the land and water, and propagated prejudiced hierarchies based on race, ability, gender, and class.
The incursion of Spanish colonizers to Turtle Island, often mislabeled as "North America," marked the introduction of elitist Christian culinary norms. Indigenous staples like corn and locally sourced wild meats were deemed nutritionally deficient. Instead, Columbus imported pigs, cattle, and sheep to uphold a purportedly superior European diet. The unchecked proliferation of these invasive species, devouring native flora, sowed the seeds of food scarcity among Indigenous communities, catalyzing enduring alterations to their diets and lifestyles.
The annihilation of traditional food sources through theft and extermination became a tool of subjugation by the colonizers. The 19th-century government-sanctioned decimation of bison forced Plains Native nations onto reservations, opening the West for gold mining and cattle ranching. Despite the once-thriving bison population of 8 million, a mere 300 wild bison remained by the end of the century. Army Col. Richard Dodge's ominous assertion, "Every buffalo dead is an Indian gone," encapsulated a genocidal strategy that persisted into the 20th century. The Dust Bowl era saw the slaughtering of sheep via the Navajo Livestock Reduction Program, an endeavor to maintain colonial control amid widespread poverty and famine.
The ramifications of colonial food practices reverberate in contemporary Indigenous communities. Gender dynamics within tribal nations underwent transformation, with women traditionally managing community sustenance through practices like Zuni waffle gardens. These grid-like gardens, mirroring waffles, harmonized with the Southwestern environment, conserving the scant water supply. Stripping away traditional Indigenous food practices marginalized cis women and Two-Spirit individuals within their societies. Stolen lands compelled the U.S. government to instruct Native men in farming instead of traditional hunting and fishing, relegating women to domestic chores.
This colonial legacy persists, influencing Indigenous communities today. Despite 80% of global market food, including staples like potatoes, corn, and beans, originating from Indigenous plants, health issues, food scarcity, and insecurity persist due to human-induced climate crises, pollution, and reliance on the colonizer for sustenance and livelihood.
The climate emergency, manifesting in record-breaking temperatures and rampant wildfires across "South America," poses an existential threat to Indigenous populations. Livelihoods tied to vital food crops, such as coffee, crumble, and Indigenous people face not only economic challenges but also a mortality toll. Wildfire smoke in "South America" accounted for 12,000 premature deaths annually between 2014 and 2019, with Indigenous lands bearing a disproportionate impact.
The reverberations of climate crises echo profoundly among Indigenous populations worldwide. Conversations with Kera Sherwood-O’Regan (Kāi Tahu), impact director at the Activate Agency in Aoteāroa (“New Zealand”), elucidate the nexus between the climate crisis, food accessibility, and health in her territories. While many Māori depend on the dairy industry for employment, this reliance jeopardizes their cultural practices. Traditional foods like Kūtai (green mussels) dwindle due to escalating ocean temperatures, exacerbated by industries like industrial dairy farming. Coastal erosion forces contemplation of relocating traditional community spaces, bearing the weight of ancestral connections.
The irony unfolds as colonial foods, imposed on Indigenous communities, contribute to health woes. Studies reveal higher rates of lactose intolerance among Māori and Polynesian populations. This trend extends to the "U.S.," where up to 75% of American Indians are estimated to be lactose intolerant, according to the National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse.
The Houma Nation in southern "Louisiana" mirrors the predicament faced by the Māori. Industrial pollution and rising waters compel many to seek employment in the oil and gas sector, paradoxically relying on industries culpable for environmental degradation. Clean water scarcity and absence of grocery stores force the Houma to consume highly processed, salt-laden, sugary sustenance available at Dollar General.
On my northeastern "Oklahoma" reservation, massive poultry farms yielded 197,121 tons of litter in 2018, causing phosphorus pollution leading to freshwater fish fatalities. Legal battles and protests notwithstanding, the state government greenlights new poultry operations in eastern "Oklahoma."
The pervasiveness of pollution in the "U.S." surfaces in a recent study revealing detectable levels of the carcinogenic PFAS in freshwater fish across all 48 states. Consuming just one of these fish equates to a month of ingesting water contaminated with PFOS, a type of PFAS. This cancer-inducing contamination extends globally, with PFAS/PFOS found in animals on every continent except Antarctica.
The crisis extends northwards, where Imperial Oil’s Kearl oil sands mine in "Alberta, Canada," has leaked 5.3 million liters of toxic tailings. Tailing ponds, repositories of hazardous wastewater from tar sands oil extraction, jeopardize Indigenous food security. The revelation that provincial and tribal governments were uninformed about the initial surface leak until 2023 exacerbates the challenges faced by Native communities. Traditional food sources, once abundant with wild berries, medicinal herbs, fish, and caribou, are rendered inedible. In "Canada," a mere quarter of First Nations adults consume locally sourced wild meat, and approximately 18% include wild plants in their diets.
United Nations and university studies underscore that Indigenous communities inhabit some of the most toxic areas globally. Coupled with a historical reliance on harmonious coexistence with the natural environment through fishing, hunting, and gathering, Indigenous populations exhibit elevated
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