Inspired by her on-campus work on the Haverfarm and with ETHOS, the political science major is spending her summer interning at City Grown Seattle, an urban farm.
Political science major Nava Kidon ’18 has nurtured interests in food justice and food systems inside and outside of the classroom at Haverford. As a member of student food-activism group ETHOS, she has learned a lot about “ethical” food—that is, fare that is local, organic, sustainable, and the product of fair trade and humane treatment—and advocated for more of it at the College. Spending time on the Haverfarm spurred on her curiosity about cultivating and processing produce. And the courses she’s taken for her peace, justice, and human rights concentration asked her to grapple with issues of social justice and community.
“Working with ETHOS at Haverford was the biggest inspiration for my summer internship,” she says. “Learning about the flaws in our current food system and about ways we can work to resist them inspired me to participate in the food justice movement, and to spend time learning more about it.”
Four days a week you can find Kidon in the dirt, planting, harvesting, and tending crops. On the fifth workday, she conducts her own research. This work isn’t just satisfying because she can see the fruits (or, more likely, vegetables) of her labor in the delicious, healthy, local food that she’s helping to provide for the farm’s neighbors, it’s also politically fulfilling.
“Helping an urban farm produce food for Seattle communities is an act of resistance against corporate, non-organic food, and my research will help me better engage in the wider fight for food justice,” says Kidon.
-Rebecca Raber with reporting by Jamauri Bowles ’17
“Summer Centered” is a series exploring our students’ Center-funded summer work.
