The World in the Garden: A Kaleidoscopic History of Place-making, Land, Security, and Environmentalism in a West African Urban Garden 公开
Chaplet, Wittika (Spring 2023)
Published
Abstract
This thesis seeks to examine the world through the lens of the Gardens of Bolomakoté-Kuinima, a vast collection of urban market-vegetable gardens in Burkina Faso’s second largest city. It explores how the Gardens are entangled in some of Burkina Faso’s central tensions; land sovereignty; political power and corruption; economic autonomy and economic development; military and social stability. The first chapter explores the history of the French conquest and colonization of the Southwestern region of Burkina Faso, and the violence in which the Gardens emerged as a form of forced labor for the colonial administration. I argue that the decision of elder gardeners to expand the Gardens of Bolomakoté-Kuinima in the 1970s transformed the Gardens from a site of violence and repression into a tool for cultural and economic autonomy. The second chapter complicates this sense of autonomy by discussing Burkina Faso’s fraught history of land tenure as it relates to the Gardens. A proximity to Bobo Dioulasso’s military camp led to an attempted eviction in 2019 which threatened the existence of the Gardens. The precarity of the land on which the gardeners build their livelihoods has led to significant economic insecurity for the gardeners. Moreover, this precarity reflects a wider history of struggle over land in Africa which was exacerbated during the colonial period, and manifests in different ways across the continent. The relationship between the military, the Gardens, and both environmental and security crises is explored further in chapter three, which tackles the rising armed conflict in Burkina Faso, and explores how the historical resilience of the gardeners can shift the way we think about militarization and security. I argue that rising militaristic rhetoric around security ignores the socio-economic factors that are crucial to both exacerbating, and abating insecurity. I use the Gardens of Bolomakoté-Kuinima as a window through which to explore the history of agricultural resilience and dynamic adaptation to the convergence of social and environmental crisis in Burkina Faso. I argue that they can be used to conceptualize approaches to security which include social and economic approaches that encourage self-sufficiency and uplift communities who have proven incredible resilience to crisis.
Table of Contents
Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………8
“We Live Our Lives Here”: The Construction Economic Autonomy with Colonized Seeds…...19
Dynamic Tradition on Contested Land……………………………………………………..……37
Planting Seeds in a Hurricane: Why Gardening Still Matters in the Midst of War…………..….52
Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….……70
Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………………….72
About this Honors Thesis
School | |
---|---|
Department | |
Degree | |
Submission | |
Language |
|
Research Field | |
关键词 | |
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor | |
Committee Members |
Primary PDF
Thumbnail | Title | Date Uploaded | Actions |
---|---|---|---|
|
The World in the Garden: A Kaleidoscopic History of Place-making, Land, Security, and Environmentalism in a West African Urban Garden () | 2023-04-10 10:46:53 -0400 |
|
Supplemental Files
Thumbnail | Title | Date Uploaded | Actions |
---|