Doctoral Dissertation Research: Understandings of Food Insecurity and Urban Space in Kansas City

这个项目，培训研究生的经验，科学的数据收集和分析的方法，探讨如何低收入的城市居民的经验和应对粮食不安全时，组织的努力，目标是缓解饥饿被引入到他们的社区。粮食不安全的人口和经济上被剥夺的城市空间越来越成为市政府和非政府方案的重点，这些方案的重点是将空地变成粮食来源。但研究表明，这些计划中的大多数都没有成功地将有色人种纳入粮食不安全的范围。这个项目询问那些由食品正义计划本身映射食物获取和食物获取的障碍。如何理解那些提供和接受服务的食品正义计划比较？粮食公正倡议和建立城市花园常常被认为是给城市居民带来的巨大好处。但是，这些是解决粮食不安全问题的最有效方法吗？居民们是否表示有其他方法来解决粮食供应和城市空置问题？该项目的数据和调查结果将得到传播，目的是为制定更有力的框架，以便在美国不同城市制定更公平的粮食获取政策。这项研究将由肯塔基州大学博士生Chhaya Kolavalli在密苏里州堪萨斯城的Ann Kingsolver博士的指导下进行。Kolavalli将在城市的一个碎片化地区进行广泛的参与观察，官员们称之为食物沙漠。该市的这一部分主要由非裔美国人居民居住，是许多旨在解决粮食不安全问题的粮食正义计划的所在地，使其成为测试这些举措有效性的理想场所。她的混合方法将包括面试，内容分析，互动社会地图，和焦点小组。交互式社会地图将被用来绘制和比较食品正义活动家服务提供者和服务接受者对食品获取，种族和城市空间的理解。这项研究的结果将有助于理解低收入少数群体如何经历和驾驭城市空间和饥饿。调查结果将与堪萨斯城市政府和非政府组织代表分享。

This project, which trains a graduate student in methods of empirical, scientific data collection and analysis, explores how low-income urban residents experience and respond to food insecurity when organizational efforts that target hunger alleviation are introduced into their neighborhoods. Food insecure populations and economically divested urban spaces are increasingly the focus of municipal government and non-governmental programs, which focus on turning vacant lots into sources of food. But studies indicate that a majority of these programs are not succeeding at including food insecure people of color. This project asks how those served by food justice programs themselves map food access and barriers to food access. How do understandings of those providing and receiving services in food justice programs compare? Food justice initiatives and the creation of urban gardens are often spoken of as strong benefits to urban citizens. But are those the most effective ways to address food insecurity, or do residents express other means of addressing food access and urban vacancy? This data and findings from this project will be disseminated with the aim of contributing to a stronger framework for designing effective policies for more equitable food access in diverse U.S. cities. This research will be conducted by University of Kentucky doctoral student Chhaya Kolavalli, with direction from Dr. Ann Kingsolver, in Kansas City, Missouri. Kolavalli will conduct extensive participant observation in a fragmented area of the city that officials refer to as a food desert. This section of the city is predominantly occupied by African American residents, and is the site of many food justice programs intended to address food insecurity, making it an ideal site to test the efficacy of these initiatives. Her mixed methods approach will include interviewing, content analysis, interactive social mapping, and focus groups. Interactive social mapping will be used to map and compare food justice activist service providers and service recipients' understandings of food access, race, and urban space. Findings from this research will contribute to understandings of how urban space and hunger are experienced and navigated by low-income minority populations. Results will be shared with Kansas City's municipal government and representatives of non-governmental organizations.