Ferne Edwards
Anthropologist | Researcher | Author | Editor | Lecturer | Consultant
Food Waste | Alternative Economies | Urban Natures | Food Policy | Just and Sustainable Cities
- Consultant services: What can I do?
With almost twenty years working on food justice and sustainability projects around the world, I can provide advice on how to grow your food project. My work takes a food systems perspective, where from my beginnings in grassroots’ food waste through to working in international food policy projects, I have extensive knowledge of how others… Read more: Consultant services: What can I do? - Spider shadow puppets
One of the things-you-must-accept of boat life – well, on my old battle-axe of a beautiful boat anyway – is that you share your life with others. Out in the open in a narrow long square box of metal and wood, the boat is exposed as a refuge to many. You enjoy the natural world… Read more: Spider shadow puppets - Disaster begets disaster: How can we prevent increasing climate change in our desperate actions to mitigate it?
Today’s news that South Korea’s president will stop at nothing to save the World Scout Jamboree is honourable to see. However, the methods to address this – as stated in the Guardian headline: “President says ‘unlimited’ air conditioned buses will be provided and food will be improved, after hundreds fall ill in heat amid soaring… Read more: Disaster begets disaster: How can we prevent increasing climate change in our desperate actions to mitigate it? - Reflecting on two decades of food resistance movements
My new book, Food Resistance Movements: Journeying through Alternative Food Networks, draws on key aspects, learnings and queries arising from ethnographies of three international food resistance examples: from the beginning of the food waste movement in Melbourne, Australia, to the emergence of the food sovereignty movement in cities throughout Venezuela, to the mature politicised autonomous… Read more: Reflecting on two decades of food resistance movements - Podcast: Dr. Ferne Edwards: Cultural Anthropologist and an Activist Scholar
On the 9 June 2021, a podcast was published about me on The Human Show. Titled, ‘Dr. Ferne Edwards: Cultural Anthropologist and an Activist Scholar‘, I was interviewed about my work on the anthropology and activism on food. Here’s the blurb from the website: We are pleased to have Ferne with us talking about anthropology… Read more: Podcast: Dr. Ferne Edwards: Cultural Anthropologist and an Activist Scholar - Sail away with me
Arriving in the UK in 2022 to start work on a new international project, I quickly discovered that the living wage was lower than affordable accommodation where my job was based. Not wanting to experience isolation again after 1.5 years of living in central Norway during COVID, I searched for other housing possibilities. Still early… Read more: Sail away with me - Discovering the freedom of long distance bike travel
Following the arrival of COVID in 2020 which necessitated living indoors for 5 months in a 30 square metre flat with no balcony (and a carbon monoxide leak) in Barcelona, I checked in my overtime and took off on my bike with camping stove and tent to cycle along the Mediterranean. I had absolutely no… Read more: Discovering the freedom of long distance bike travel - Recounting tales from the bin
Chapter 2 in my recent book, Food Resistance Movements explores the freegan subculture in Australian cities—people who choose to consume food that would otherwise go to waste to protest overconsumption and hunger in the west. Two freegan case studies are discussed: members of Food Not Bombs, an activist community kitchen and free meal programme; and… Read more: Recounting tales from the bin - From an invisible to global problem: the twists and turns of the food waste movementSince the early 2000s, food waste has emerged from an invisible to global problem. In Chapter 5 of my recent book, Food Resistance Movements, I describe the twists and turns of this change and the continuing shortfalls that curb the crisis of food waste. This chapter contextualises radical food waste movements such as ‘freegans’ –… Read more: From an invisible to global problem: the twists and turns of the food waste movement
Ferne Edwards 