Contested Knowledge and Disputed Practice: Maize and Groundnut Seeds and Child Feeding in Northern Malawi
- ISBN-10
- 054277934X
- ISBN-13
- 9780542779343
- Pages
- 676
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2006
- Publisher
- Cornell University, Aug.
- Author
- Rachel Nicole Bezner Kerr
Description
This dissertation focuses on three aspects of the complex behavioral and social milieu that influences nutritional and agricultural outcomes and practice in Malawi. I examine the linkages between social relations, knowledge production and practice, in multiple and overlapping arenas: the sciences, government and international organizations, communities and households. The first aspect that I examine is the historical role of the colonial state and agricultural science. In this section I examine two periods during the 1930s in which the colonial state apparatus attempted and failed to bring groundnuts into the global export economy. The second section of my dissertation focuses on contemporary social relations and practices that affect farmers' access to and control of maize and groundnut seed, and the institutional power and knowledge linkages with villages in northern Malawi. The concept of narratives is used to analyze different debates occurring within and between homes, villages, NGOs, state departments and international organizations. The debates include: (1) What kind of seeds should farmers plant; (2) How should farmers get access to seed; and (3) What should farmers do with their seed? Questions about seed highlight power relations along boundaries of gender, class, race and national lines, which have arisen partially in reaction to the changing global economic order, but also reflect longer structural and cultural dimensions in Malawian history. Hidden behind the debates are broader arguments about legitimate knowledge and control of both groundnut and maize seed in Malawi between farmers, seed companies, NGOs and the state. In the third section of my dissertation I use the Soils, Food and Healthy Communities project (SFHC) as a case study to understand current child care and feeding behaviors that influence child health outcomes in Malawi. I contrast scientific and local perspectives on child feeding, and the implications for knowledge production and child feeding practices. Paternal grandmothers have a powerful role within the extended family in terms of child care, and have differing ideas about early child feeding from those of conventional Western medicine. This section argues that scientists need to better understand the limitations of their own knowledge, and seek to understand the local perspectives, in order to find integrated solutions for child feeding. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).
