Category Archives: Uncategorized

Smith, A, MacKinnon, JB. 2007. The 100-mile diet: a year of local eating. Vintage Canada Edition, Toronto, Ontario. This week’s reading brought the whole class full circle. We started with James and Alisa, makes sense that we end with them too. It gave a kind of closure that many classes are missing in this strangeContinue reading “The final word: the 100-Mile Diet”

Pollan,M. 2006. Omnivore’s Dilemma: a Natural History of Four Meals. Penguin Group, New York, New York. This chapter of Pollan’s reminded me a lot of the half of the 100 Mile Diet that we have read. It took me a while to get into the groove of reading it, but once I was there, IContinue reading “Omnivore’s Dilemma: Mark 2”

Pollan, Michael. Botany of Desire. Random House, 2001. Greetings from my couch! I am still in Kamloops, working from home. The week has been kind of crazy transitioning all my classes to online, but I am hanging in there and starting to get into the groove of working from home. My first task during social distancingContinue reading “Botany of Desire: Take 2”

Hanson T. 2015. The triumph of seeds. New York: Basic Books. 277. Reading Thor Hanson is like a breath of fresh air after reading Pollan. While they have similar styles, focusing on one plant to tell a larger story, I find myself much more engaged in Hanson’s writing. Throughout Hanson’s story of seed defense, heContinue reading “The Rise of Seeds 2.0”

Pollan, Michael. Botany of Desire. Random House, 2001. The Botany of Desire tells the tale of humans and plants using apples and potatoes to guide us through the process. These plants are effective at telling the story because of their commonality. If Pollan were to use plants unfamiliar to the reader, it would be much harderContinue reading “Botany of Desire”

Pollan,M. 2006. Omnivore’s Dilemma: a Natural History of Four Meals. Penguin Group, New York, New York. In the first part of this book, Pollan tells us the story of corn. I can’t say that corn has ever been a thing I have thought particularly hard about, however, Pollan manages to write over 100 pages onContinue reading “Omnivore’s Dilemma”

Diamond J. 1999. Guns, germs, and steel. W.W. Norton & Company Inc., New York, New York I found the writing in this part of Diamond’s book much more dense than that of the previous chapter we read. In these chapters, Diamond tells of the rise of agriculture in different parts of the world. In theseContinue reading “Guns, Germs, and Steel Chapters 4-6, 8”

Turner N. 2005. The earth’s blanket. University of Washington Press, Seattle, Washington. Nancy Turner’s The Earth’s Blanket discusses an incredibly important and rarely known part of the relationship between plants and humans. We so often view our relationships with plants in a very European sense, as Turner puts it “not only the indigenous people butContinue reading “The Earth’s Blanket”

Diamond J. 1999. Guns, germs, and steel. W.W. Norton & Company Inc., New York, New York Pollan M. 2001. Botany of desire. Random House, Toronto, Canada. This week’s reading tackled the beast that is artificial selection. Both Diamond and Pollan introduce artificial selection in the attempt to alter the way the reader thinks of theContinue reading “Guns Germs and Steel and Botany of Desire Reading Response”

Hanson T. 2015. The triumph of seeds. New York: Basic Books. 277. This book felt pleasantly familiar to me. Thor uses simple words to describe complex topics in a voice that is reminiscent of Lyn’s. The topics Thor discussed were ones I felt fairly knowledgeable about, but he explained them in a way that wouldContinue reading “Triumph of Seeds”