green media (spring 10)

in spring, i'm teaching three classes - two of them new. one of the new ones is green media. classes begin friday, january 29th.


Green Media
Fridays 9:40 am-12:25 pm (and some lunches, too)
Education 104 (and sometimes in the Garden)

Professor: David Silver
Office: Kalmanovitz 141
Office Hours: Tues & Thurs 10:30-11:30 am & by appointment

Green Media is a special topics production class devoted to making media about making food. Throughout the semester, students will plan, plant, tend, and harvest a veggie plot in USF's organic garden; research, cook, and share a selection of seasonal, regional recipes; and eat, experience, and experiment with real food. Further, using social media like twitter, flickr, facebook, blogs, and video, students will make and share media about growing, cooking, and eating food. Finally, students will work collaboratively to design and build two food-related exhibits in Gleeson Library.

Learning Goals:
o to learn how to plan and plant a garden;
o to learn how to research and cook 3-4 seasonal, regional, and delicious meals;
o to learn how to use social media to document the planting and preparing of food;
o to learn how to work collaboratively; and
o to become more aware of and in tune with seasons.

Book:
Please purchase Novella Carpenter's Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer (Penguin Press, 2009).

* All other course readings are either free and online, available outside my office, or available at Gleeson Library.

Calendar:
Friday, January 29
Discuss the syllabus and course expectations. Visit our garden plot. Begin using twitter.

Friday, February 5
Read Patricia Harris, David Lyon, and Sue McLaughlin, “Food & Life,” from The Meaning of Food, pp. 1-59; Michael Pollan, Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch, New York Times Magazine, July 29, 2009. Watch Britta Riley and Rebecca Bray, Window Farms (Video - 1:38), November 3, 2009. Library workshop with USF librarians Debbie Benrubi and Sherise Kimura.

Friday, February 12
Read Maggie Gosselin, Sarah Klein, and Jessica Prentice’s “San Francisco Bay Area Local Foods Wheel”; Localvore Network, California availability guide; selections from Pam Pierce’s Golden Gate Gardening: The Complete Guide to Year-Round Food Gardening in the San Francisco Bay Area & Coastal California; Allison Arieff, “Hive Minds: As Honeybees around the world vanish, one Bay Area biologist is enlisting an army of backyard gardeners to help figure out why,” Sunset, August 2009, pp. 54-56; and Maira Kalman, Back to the Land ... And the Pursuit of Happiness, New York Times, November 26, 2009. Plan our garden plot. Begin using flickr. Due in class: Breakfast Project.

Friday, February 19
Read Novella Carpenter, “Turkey,” from Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer, pp. 1-98; Field trip with Justin Valone to forage for wild greens and stinging nettles.

Friday, February 26
Read “Basic White Bread – Ten Steps to Fresh-baked Goodness,” from Sunset Cook Book of Breads, pp. 8-9; Mark Bittman, Making No-Knead Bread (Video – 4:58), New York Times, December 29, 2006; Brother Rick Curry, S.J., “Making Bread,” from The Secrets of Jesuit Breadmaking, pp. 11-21; Molly Katzen, "An Illustrated Guide to the Baking of Yeast Bread," from The Enchanted Broccoli Forest, pp. 86-95; and Lulu McCllister, How to Make a Delicious Omelet Using Wild Foods. Watch Giselle Kennedy, Brew (Video - 13:50), How-to Homestead, 2009; and Sergey Yazvinsky, One Minute Apple Pie (Video - 1:29), Serious Eats, September 10, 2009. Bake a loaf of bread. Begin blogging.

Friday, March 5
Read Novella Carpenter, “Rabbit,” from Farm City, pp. 99-184; and John Emerson, Neo Gardenism, Social Design Notes blog, June 15, 2009. Library workshop with USF librarians Debbie Benrubi and Sherise Kimura. Join garden guest Novella Carpenter, author (Farm City) and urban homesteader (Ghost Town Farm), for lunch and discussion.

Friday, March 12
Read Patricia Harris, David Lyon, and Sue McLaughlin, “Food & Culture,” from The Meaning of Food, pp. 61-105; Keith McHenry, The Story of Food Not Bombs (Parts 1-4); and Sandra Cate, "'Breaking Bread with a Spread' in the San Francisco County Jail," Gastronomica, Summer 2008, pp. 17-24. Join garden guest Keith McHenry, co-founder of Food Not Bombs, for lunch and discussion.

Friday, March 19:
SPRING BREAK (No Class)

Friday, March 26
Read Novella Carpenter, “Pig,” from Farm City, pp. 185-269; and Ian Frazier, The Cursing Mommy Cooks Italian, The New Yorker, January 11, 2010, pp. 34-35. Due in class: Media-Food Person Research Project.

Friday, April 2:
GOOD FRIDAY (No Class)
Read Tina Peterson, "Bringing Up Baby (Carrots), Gastronomica, Fall 2008, pp. 55-59. Watch Deborah Koons Garcia’s The Future of Food (Video - 1:28:51); and The Meatrix (I, II, and II 1/2).

Friday, April 9
Read Douglas Quenqua, To Harvest Squash, Click Here, New York Times, October 28, 2009. Watch expertvillage, How to Grow Squash in a Vegetable Garden (Video - 2:44), October 24, 2008; Melinda Stone, The Humanure Cycle (Video: 8:27), How-to Homestead, 2008; and a healthy dose of River Cottage. Visit, play, and be ready to discuss in class FarmVille. Due in class: Lunch Project.

Friday, April 16
Read Kim Severson, Neighbor, Can You Spare A Plum? New York Times, June 10, 2009; Emma Brown, Changing How We Live and Eat, One Fig at a Time, Common Dreams, February 2, 2009; Fallen Fruit, "Take Back the Fruit: Public Space and Community Activism," from Food, edited by John Knechtel, pp. 94-103; and Roxanne Webber, New iPhone App Finds You Free Fruit, Chow, January 12, 2010. Visit and be ready to discuss in class City Fruit Tree Mapper; Neighborhood Fruit; Fallen Fruit; and Urban Edibles.

Friday, April 23 (David out of town)
Read Elizabeth Kolbert, Green Like Me: Living without a fridge, and other experiments in environmentalism, The New Yorker, August 31, 2009, pp. 70-74; Ten websites that will help you eat with greater awareness, Culinate blog, August 10, 2009; and Megan Gordon, Eat, Read, Look: Food Websites Worth Your Time, Bay Area Bites blog, January 18, 2010.

Friday, April 30
Read Rachel Laudan, “A Plea for Culinary Modernism: Why We Should Love New, Fast, Processed Food,” Gastronomica, February 2001, pp 36-44; Caitlin Flanagan, Cultivating Failure: How school gardens are cheating our most vulnerable students, The Atlantic, January/February 2010; Angela McGregor, Cultivating Conversation: How Caitlin Flanagan has got us all thinking out loud, Cornell Garden-Based Learning blog, January 27, 2010; and at least two of the essays McGregor links to. Discuss semester’s successes and shortcomings. Brainstorm final party.

Friday, May 7
Read Mark Andrew Boyer, Is a Food Revolution Now in Season? Yes, It Is, OrganicNation.tv blog, September 4, 2009; Sarah van Gelder, 8 Ways to Join the Local Food Movement, Yes! Magazine, February 13, 2009; and Remi Bouvier, Vallicans Guerilla Gardening Skate (Video - 6:00), Eggheads blog, November 2, 2009. Due in class: Last Supper Project.

This class has no final exam.


Grading:
20% Class and Garden Participation
10% Breakfast Project
10% Lunch Project
10% Last Supper Project
20% Media-Food Person Research Project
20% Seasonal Foods Library Exhibit Group Project
20% Food & Culture Library Exhibit Group Project

* If you are curious or concerned about your grade, you can request a meeting with me anytime during the semester.

Rulez:
1. Read all assigned readings, watch all assigned videos, and visit all assigned web sites prior to class.
2. In class, in the garden, and in the kitchen, listen to and learn from everyone.
3. No late work accepted.
4. No drinking out of non-reusable containers in class.