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Jennifer Cognard-Black's Food Writing Students Release "Tilling Tales" Kate Farm Podcast

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Illustration of a chicken on grass with a watering can above the text "Tilling Tales: Stories from the Kate Farm" in decorative fonts.

Jennifer Cognard-Black, professor of English, taught an upper-level Food Writing workshop last spring--cross-listed with Environmental Studies (ENST)--in which her students engaged in a collaborative podcast project called “Tilling Tales” to help raise awareness about the Kate Chandler Campus Community Farm. The Food Writers volunteered out at the Kate Farm, digging in the dirt and helping with the chickens. They then conducted interviews with Kate Farm interns and with ENST Professors Barry Muchnick and Matthew Wilfong who oversee the Kate Farm as well as with community partners such as Bernie Fowler of Farming4Hunger. From these conversations and their hands-on experience, the Food Writers then drafted, revised, and recorded their “Tilling Tales” stories as podcasts, each of them highlighting vibrant aspects of the Farm, including its history; the cornucopia of produce, herbs, and flowers grown there; the eggs and broiler chickens produced there; the Kate Farm Stand in the Campus Center; last spring's eco-artivism puppet performance "Making the Invisible Visible" held on Earth Day; and and other community-based efforts and projects supported by the Farm that work to assuage food insecurity, promote biodiversity, and support more sustainable food systems in Southern Maryland. 

The "Tilling Tales: Stories from the Kate Farm" podcast series is now available on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0dg8axgqt4UU2k3VqePHlJ?si=wLQ--8rcRPSSytlk7cXnoA

Individual “Tilling Tales” episodes include:

01. Lavender: A Purple Wonder with Annika Kumwembe

02. Disabled Dreaming: Kate Farm as a Vision of a more Accessible World with Arin Wilson

03. From Dove to Dawn: The History of Farming in St. Mary's with Athena Wheatley

04. Chickens with Charley Flowers

05. Why Should We Volunteer? The Culture of Volunteerism at the Kate Farm with Bryce Carlin

06. Flocking to the Farm with Brynn Desmond

07. Annual Performance Review with Caden Connolly

08. Waking Up with Casper Kinzie

09. Bowling for Flowers with Dakota Mazuzan-Blackwell & Emily Feldman

10. Earth in Motion: Giant Puppetry and Eco-Activism with Ingrid Boshoff & Erin Rhodes

11. Farming for Freedom with Holli Kobialka

12. Standing on Business with Mason Lipczenko

13. Magically Marvelous Materials at The Kate Farm with Rachel Cardwell

14. The History and Healing Power of Mulch with Thomas Golladay

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