Farms

OCTOBER 2021

233 pages, 6 x 9 in., 40 b&w photos, 3 maps, 3 charts 978-0-7748-6546-3 PB $32.95 USD / £19.99 GBP also available as an e-book

ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY / AGRICULTURE / PUBLIC POLICY

MICHAEL CLASSENS is an assistant professor in the Trent School of the Environment at Trent University. His work on a range of issues related to social and ecological justice has appeared in numerous interdisciplinary journals.

From Dismal Swamp to Smiling Farms

Food, Agriculture, and Change in the Holland Marsh

Michael Classens

“This book is that rare thing, a serious work of historical scholarship that also tells a complete story: how the Holland Marsh and its history contribute to Canada’s current system of food and agriculture.”

— JAMES MURTON, associate professor, Department of History, Nipissing University

Driving through the Holland Marsh one is struck immediately by the black richness of its soil. This is some of the most profitable farmland in Canada. But the small agricultural preserve just north of Toronto is a canary in a coal mine. From Dismal Swamp to Smiling Farms recounts the transformation, use, and protection of the Holland Marsh, exploring how human ideas about nature shape agriculture, while agriculture in turn shapes ideas about nature. Drawing on interviews, media accounts, and archival data, Michael Classens concludes that celebrations of the Marsh as the quintessential example of peri-urban food sustainability and farmland protection have been too hasty. Instead, he demonstrates how capitalism and liberalism have fashioned and ultimately imperilled agriculture in the area. This fascinating case study reveals the contradictions and deficiencies of contemporary farmland preservation paradigms, highlighting the challenges of forging a more socially just and ecologically rational food system.

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