South East Market, Equitable Food

SOUTH EAST MARKET FOOD EQUITABLE

BY ALLISON ARNOLD PHOTOGRAPHY BY TWO EAGLES MARCUS

“I had this idea and dream that there should be this little bodega in my neighborhood,” says Alita Kelly, founder of South East Market. “I just dreamed up this little store that had this cultural aspect to it too, and brought together the community around food.”

Kelly has a personal connection to healing through food and over the years, began building nutrition programs, eventually leading her to study environmental science and sustainable business at the University of Michigan.

While she had been developing this dream for years, it was graduating in the midst of COVID-19 that propelled her to turn it into reality.

Despite a lack of grocery stores in the south east neighborhood, Kelly says that market research shows that many large grocery stores have passed at the space that South East Market now occupies, despite knowing of the need.

is is why she uses the term food apartheid versus food desert.

“A desert refers to a thriving ecosystem and so the term that we prefer to use is food apartheid, because it acknowledges the intentional separation of resources from this community.”

ose without transportation have an increased disadvantage to accessing fresh and healthy food.

“We’ve also heard neighbors talk about shopping for their weekly groceries at the Walgreens up the street,” says Khara DeWit, co-founder of South East Market.

SIGN IN THE FRONT WINDOW OF SOUTH EAST MARKET

DeWit, who has her own relationshipbased accounting practice, originally met with Kelly about handling the accounting for the market, but after they discovered their bond of food as medicine and community, Kelly asked her to join the business as a partner. Similarly, DeWit also had a healing journey with food. With help from a naturopath, she was able to use food and herbs to heal and reverse symptoms of Crohn’s disease and wean herself o medications.

“We see this being our time to lead as women of color and I was so grateful “A desert refers to a thriving ecosystem and so the term that we prefer to use is food apartheid, because it acknowledges the intentional separation of resources from this community.” -ALITA KELLY

for Alita to invite me into her dream and vision.”

In one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Grand Rapids, Kelly and DeWit aim to provide culturally appropriate products for their neighbors. Products are sourced rst from Black, brown and female businesses and farms. As far as produce, however, Kelly says that there’s not many Black producers in the U.S., or the world, due to the dispossession of land and systemic oppression, despite having the most indigenous agricultural knowledge.

Two current suppliers are Groundswell Community Farm, owned by a Black man, Bruce Michael, and Agape Organic Farm, which is run by a Black woman, Shara Trierweiler.

Customers can also nd a variety of Pete’s Big Jerk sauces and elderberry syrup made by a local Black woman.

“And we’re not exclusive. A lot of people, they hear ‘oh, source rst from black, brown, female, and then they think only,” says Kelly. “And so really, we’re centering our business around supporting those individuals, because we know that they have unique challenges and so in order to build equity within the food system, we have to make sure that we provide them some additional support that the current system we operate within does not.”

ere’s a large philanthropic community in West Michigan, but Kelly says that the current system is more reactionary to poverty, not always addressing the root issues.

“We see these food pantries or these food giveaways to people that are nancially challenged, but oftentimes, those methods of providing for increasing access don’t encompass the dignity that our neighbors deserve by picking their own groceries, by the food being culturally appropriate for them, by providing the food in a space where everyone can come together as far as di erent socio economic levels of people,” says Kelly. To address some of the root causes of the emergency food system and nancial insecurity, the market’s pay it forward program allows customers to donate funds to subsidize the cost of some products for those that are nancially challenged.

“We want to hold on to the dignity of the farmers who work so hard to grow this awesome local produce, and it costs more money because they’re on a smaller scale and so they still deserve, whatever they believe that their product is worth, they still deserve that amount,” says Kelly. “And that food should still be accessible to people that live in our neighborhood.

South East Market isn’t open to everyone just yet, but is currently in a phased launch with a small cohort of customers. DeWit says that they are purposely holding o on opening to the broader public because they are waiting on their SNAP EBT approval, which will then allow them to be inclusive of all customers. ey’re also using this time to work on their systems such as their e-commerce site, which current customers use to shop online, and building up their curbside and delivery system to further accessibility for the community.

It’s apparent that South East Market is more than just a place of transaction for nourishment, but it’s part of the sustainable solution to the barriers and injustices in our food system and in our community.

What we’re trying to do is provide a space where people that want to be a part of the solution and people that are oppressed by this system can come together, and we want the southeast market to be a vessel for that work,” says Kelly.

Allison Arnold is a writer and avid adventurer who loves hiking, traveling and trying new foods. She loves writing about food and culture on her blog, For the Love of Tacos.

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Wom_n: e Power Of Words

by Akansha Das

Akansha Das, Premed student volunteer with Women’s Health Collective

Terminology has an immense weight on its shoulders. A responsibility to convey an essence. A duty to encapsulate the various and often complex aspects of a personality. An obligation to express to the world what is within. Words certainly have the ability to stretch the confi nes of their connotation through an individual’s personal relationship with them or society’s given connotation; yet sometimes, our current labels crack under that pressure, unable to bear the gravity on their small, unaccompanied shoulders. Whether we recognize it or not, terminology, labels and words have an immense power. In an effort to address this, The Women’s Health Collective logo includes a “+” after the word “women” to include individuals who use alternative spellings of the word - such as womxn, womyn, womin, wommin, wombyn, and more to recognize that though they may be different, each are equal in their own right and no one label is a “default.”

The rise of various spellings for the word “women” comes from the basis that “women’’ contains “men” in it and the word’s linguistic history denotes a dependency on men. In a New York Times article, Harvard Sociology Professor Keridwen Luis says that the term can perpetuate the idea that men are the cultural norm. Though some may argue that simply because the word’s history is rooted in dependency and the “default nature of men’’ doesn’t mean that this is the way the term is used today, scientists may argue something different. In another New York Times article, UC Santa Barbara Cognitive Science professor Lera Boroditsky argues that repeated use of a term can subtly or implicitly tell our brains to draw a connection between gender and objects of subjects without any gender correlation. This could in turn strengthen a subtle correlation between stereotypic gender roles and women’s place in them through the use of “women.”

In an effort to be more independent, the term “wimmin’’ began fl oating around in the 1900s to represent the pronunciation of the term in different dialects. Womyn and wombyn enters the feminist timeline in the 1970s, most notably with the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, a festival put on in attempt to answer Woodstock in a feminist manner. However, this term sparked rightful backlash when the Festival only permitted “womyn-born-womyn’’ and therefore excluded many trangender women and members of the LGBTQ+ community from participating in the festival, giving the term “womyn’’ a negative and exclusive connotation. In today’s era, “womyn’’ has confl icting views with some rebranding the term to be inclusive of trans women while others claiming the term’s history prevents it from doing so.

The most well-known and according to some, the most inclusive term, is “womxn.” The diffi culty in pronouncing womxn is often what draws individuals to it, forcing us to think about what gender really means. The “x” (as with its symbolism in math and common language) opens the door to many possibilities for what the term can mean for someone. In its essence, it represents precisely what gender theorists advocate for—for individuals rather than society to mold and defi ne their gender and not the other way around. In a New York Times article, Ebony Miranda, the organizer for Seattle’s Womxn’s March that fi rst proposed using the term “womxn”, says that the term encompasses “all who have been affected by misogyny and women-related issues.” In recent years, the Womxn’s March in Seattle and the Womxn’s Energy Week at Kirkland College have popularized the term but the word’s inclusion in mainstream discourse has drawn inevitable backlash. Most notably, in a BBC News article, London’s Welcome Collection in 2017 received rage from individuals saying that womxn’s inclusion of nonbinary and genderfl uid individuals is confusing as they don’t strive to fall into the traditional category of a “woman.”

We at the Women’s Health Collective recognize that this debate might be ongoing for a while and validate the opinions and experiences of individuals who adopt any of these spellings. We recognize that there may not be agreement on the topic and we encourage this discourse as it holds everyone accountable to actively think about the terminology we use and its powerful effect on others. If an individual feels that a specifi c term is able to carry on its shoulders the burden of explaining their complex gender expression, we welcome the opportunity for them to do so. At the end of the day, the Women’s Health Collective considers each of these spellings valid and equal to each other and makes itself a safe space for an individual to spell and defi ne their gender-identifying category in any way they choose.

Nisha McKenzie PA-C 630 Kenmoor Ave. Ste 103 | Grand Rapids, MI 49546 | 616.600.4950 | info@whcollective.com