Almost every aspect of life on earth interacts with soil. Soils are old. Soils take time to develop from their parent material. Soils embody life itself. Yet, the concept of soil varies depending on the epistemic culture applied to define what soil is. Often soils exist in states of naturalness or unnaturalness. For example, Minami (2009) describes the Chinese compound character for agricultural soil 土壤 (tǔ rǎng), the first character (tǔ) represents soil in its natural state, and the second character (rǎng) represents soil once it has been broken up for agricultural purposes. Here, an interesting dichotomy presents itself: soil as it is and soil as it is once altered by human intervention. This dichotomous classificatory system describes changes that result from soil processes interacting; however, curiously, soil in only one category is the product of perceived human interaction.
In this essay, I seek to disrupt the dichotomous classificatory systems of soil by looking at the interconnections made possible through soil in the everyday life. By expanding on the ways humans participate in soil processes, along with other organisms, we can begin to see the social boundaries mapped upon the ground. By starting at the soil, we can map out whose hands are cultivating crops, and what types of cultural crops are we cultivating. These encounters allow us to look at the ways that soils and humans work together.
My interest in soils emerges from my ongoing graduate research on urban agriculture projects in San Antonio and Austin, Texas. In a comparative study of community gardens and food forests, I look at the differences between the two styles of communal gardening, as well as cultural differences in the practices across the urban spaces. I am interested in community gardens and food forests because they have the potential to function as mechanisms to promote place-making, social learning, and foster community (Hite et al. 2017). They are often positioned as accessible solutions for urban communities living in food deserts or regions experiencing biodiversity decline, economic decline, or disinvestment (Raneng, Howes, and Picking 2023; Littman 2022; D’Anieri 2022; Hite et al. 2017).
As a volunteer at several establishments across the two cities, I have observed that gardens are places of community expansion. This means that volunteers are doing more than just learning about growing plants. Often, they are exchanging cultural foodways, like learning how to cook with pig weed (Amaranthus palmeri) or lambs quarters (Chenopodium album). They expand their concept of community to include these non-human agents through observations and interactions while out in the garden. By learning the names of new plant and insect species, gardeners are able to meet the neighbors they always had but had not acknowledged. This makes gardeners more aware of their interactions within their expanded community and can lead gardeners to be more mindful. Often these gardeners elect to use non-toxic pest control measures like diatomaceous earth and neem oil, and organic fertilizers like fish emulsion.
Cantaloupes on Eco Centro’s urban farm in downtown San Antonio. Not only do these fruits represent the collaborative labor of the farmer and volunteers, but they also represent reciprocity. As all the food grown on the farm goes towards San Antonio Community College’s food pantry that serves students who face with food insecurity. Image taken by Author.
Interacting with Soils
I pondered on the difference between the world above and below as I squatted over my garden bed at Faith Presbyterian Community Garden in Austin, Texas, while pulling out weeds. Using my right hand, I grasped a bunch of crabgrass (digitaria spp.) and pulled it from the dirt. The dark brown dirt clung to both my mind and the roots from the bunches in clay-like lumps. Each bunch I pulled gouged a piece of earth to expose the surface as an artificial boundary. I squatted on the boundary of the soil horizon to notice my own presence and the presence of everything else above the surface. My most immediate neighbor, a well-established fig tree (Ficus carcia) stood tall next to me.
When I first think of soils, I think of who and why certain people interact with them. Do only certain people interact with the soil, or do we all interact with soils? What, if anything, has changed our interactions with soils?
One suspect for this change is capitalism. As Du Bois (1935) argued, the economic foundation of capitalism is rooted within institutional racist ideas and practices. I think it is important to acknowledge how our economic system is shaping our relations by not only racializing humans but also our relations to the environment and public space. Access to soil cultivation can alter these power dynamics through fostering a sense of community empowerment that resists the centrality of the human. This creates an awareness of the environment around you by learning to recognize the other-than-human community members and their critical contributions to our shared world (Douglas 2019; Baptista 2022).
Due to the rise of capital-intensive agriculture, a large percentage of the earth’s surface has been cleared and designated towards monocropping. This results in a loss of biodiversity, which creates a homogenized landscape (Davies 2021). This homogenization of the landscape serves a selected elite, primarily wealthy white people. I demonstrate this point by looking towards the Civil Rights era and the food stories that arise from the Mississippi delta (Smith 2023). Instances like the Greenwood food blockade clearly demonstrate the ways in which capitalistic forces intersect with political forces within our food systems to create structurally violent outcomes that exclude the poor as well as BIPOC communities (Smith 2020). Such forces are historically situated upon the enslavement and exploitation of impoverished groups and marginalized populations to establish and maintain large scale agricultural operations (think of prison plantations and sharecropping), which aim to generate large sums of profit. Therefore, the homogenized food landscape creates structural inaccessibility for anyone who exists outside of the groups privileged enough to maintain access. However, community gardens and food forests highlight the potential for strengthening accessibility locally and fostering community wellbeing. Through collaboration with all our community members we can form lasting relationships that positively impact our lives.
Possibilities of Collaboration
Last spring, I returned to my garden to test the viability of my old seeds. I brought with me okra, opal basil, bluebonnet, and mesclun salad mix. I tilled the earth and created several rows in the soil to plant the various seeds. I measured out the appropriate quantity from yellowed and worn-out paper packets. I then gently covered the rows with a sweeping motion using my fingers and watered them well. Afterward, I took a photo to document what seeds I planted and where, to determine if they germinated or not. To date, none of the seeds have sprouted but the act itself makes me wonder about the role of soil in our everyday life.
Soils depend upon their ability to form relationships with a myriad of organisms. Like the human bodies that interact with it, soils are complex and worldly agents. Soils have different textures, grit, coarseness, porosity, specialization, various parent materials, as well as different memories. To demonstrate this point, I would like to point out how varying epistemological communities view soil. For geologists, soil is merely the earth’s soft skin covering the layers of hard and buried bedrock. Yet for pedologists, soils are natural three-dimensional bodies that exist in time and space which are conditioned by their environments both climatically and physically (K. Adhikari et al. 2024). As I see it, soils impact every facet of life and cannot be separated from itself—nor the surface.
If soils are complex living organisms, then perhaps they can be considered to have a body. If soils have a body, then how does my human body collaborate with the soil’s body?
Mary Douglas’ work on dirt in Purity and Danger offers important insights. As Douglas explains, we must prepare to see on the Earth a symbol of our physical body and on that body, reproduced in small, we can pick apart the powers and dangers credited with our own social reproduction (Douglas 2002); however, our social reproduction is collaborative. This is important because humans are not only human (Haraway 2008). This means that humans are constantly interacting with tools, technologies, each other, and other animals to create ways of relating and living in the world. In other words, the soil body can reflect our social body. Soils are in constant dialogue with our economic and socio-political systems to create social narratives about how we ought to interact and/or collaborate with our environment.
Lambs quarters are a delicious leafy green that can be eaten raw or prepared like spinach. This plant is hardy and grows abundantly throughout Festival Beach Food Forest. Image by author.
As I center myself in Central Texas, meeting gardeners of a diverse range of ages, races, and nationalities, I continue to hold on to these questions of landscape homogenization, collaborations, and accessibility. As a volunteer at the Festival Beach food forest in downtown Austin, I observe how the group focuses on prioritizing people’s enjoyment of the space. When, after a Saturday morning workday, our group of volunteers sit down to enjoy passionflower tea sourced from the food forest, I see people attempting to demonstrate all the abundance the natural world has to offer if we can collaborate with it. This reminds me of the value of collaborating with the soil. When I go to Tomox Talom Food Forest in South San Antonio on a Tuesday evening and work side by side with people who regard me in a friendly and familial way, I’m reminded of the safety in community and the kindness of humanity. This reminder promotes my desire to continue to expand my relationships with both the non-human and human community members around me. While out on Sunday morning at Sunshine Community Garden in North Austin, I am pleased to partake in the challenge of holistic landscape design and the joy of gossiping with other gardeners. This reminds me not to take anything too seriously but rather enjoy the experimentation of collaborative work. And when I’m fortunate enough to be at the Eco Centro in downtown San Antonio, I see the labor of love that goes into maintaining and supporting urban agricultural engagement within downtown San Antonio as well as with San Antonio Community College students. This reminds me that there are others who greatly value our other-than-human collaborators.
By looking at the myriad ways through which human bodies are working with the soil body, we can begin to break down the social boundaries upon soil. In this way, soils are not just what we interact with but also what we collaborate with to imagine a more equitable world. As we move through our days, remember the soils that support your activities because no matter where you are, those soils are there too, beneath your feet.
This post was curated by Contributing Editor Tayeba Batool.
Acknowledgements
I want to acknowledge the organizations that have graciously let me learn with them, Dr. Angela VandenBroek for having our class write an almost publishable term paper, Dr. Aimee Villarreal for encouraging me to pause and feel despite everything, Tayeba Batool for being an awesome editor, Kimberly Anderson for letting me read all my writing out loud to you, and to everyone else who has allowed me bounce ideas about soils and collaboration off of them, and with them. May we continue to positively influence each other!
References
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