Against the Grain: Refugee Family's Learning Through the Land During the Pandemic

• In Event: Responses to the Pandemic to Promote Equity and Social Justice in Education

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has manifested an unsustainable and unjust system in globalized food production and distribution that heavily relies on the exploitation of migrant labourers as well as commodification and destruction of ecology. Based on cultural-historical activity theory, learning can be conceptualized as an activity that disrupts and alters social and historical dilemmas. In this context, this study shines light on intergenerational epistemology exhibited by a Syrian refugee family engaged in traditional farming that was sustained and developed intergenerationally after their resettlement to Canada. Data for this ethnographic study include video-recorded shared walks on an urban farm with the family. We reposition such epistemology as a catalyst to disrupt and alter the historical dilemmas in globalized food production and distribution.

Authors

• Miwa Takeuchi, University of Calgary

• Raneem Elhowari, University of Calgary

• Jenny Yuen, University of Calgary