Shelley Yael Dennis, MD, PhD, is Faculty Chair of Health Sciences and Sustainability at Rio Salado College in Tempe, Arizona. Dr. Dennis earned her medical degree at University of Illinois at Chicago, where she witnessed the public-health impacts of food-system disparities. Intrigued by the theological implications of systemic inequalities, she went on to earn her doctorate from Drew University. Her transdisciplinary approach integrates political, philosophical, and theological thought in support of more just and sustainable social practices.
"This singular book explores the concepts of sovereignty, how
religion has shaped and molded such concepts, as well as the direct
and unyielding consequences these power structures have had, and
are still having, on environmental health, food security, and
global environmental politics . . . Edible Entanglements rips off
the blinders and explores not just how religious concepts have
played into power structures and thus impacted our planet, but
considers how religious thought may help us get out of the mess we
are in."
--Elizabeth J. Ruther, Coastal State-Federal Relations Coordinator,
Oregon Coastal Management Program
"How odd, given the consuming global challenge of food, that so
little of the discourse of eco-social justice, let alone of
political theology, has focused on the matter. With this
multi-faceted yet attractively accessible work, S. Yael Dennis has
rectified the situation. Reconsidering the notion of 'food
sovereignty, ' it provides an interdisciplinary introduction to
political theology that takes the latter where it has never gone.
Edible Entanglements makes a brilliant contribution to political,
economic, and ecological studies in religion."
--Catherine Keller, Author of Political Theology of the Earth: Our
Planetary Emergency and the Struggle for a New Public (2018)
"In this book, Shelley Dennis develops a political theology of food
that engages the important idea of sovereignty. On the one hand,
sovereignty is the nation-state's unified power to decide, based on
the work of Carl Schmitt. On the other hand, food sovereignty
offers an important site of resistance to the onslaught of
corporate capitalism and its food security regime. Dennis combines
excellent theoretical analysis with valuable ecological
applications. Anyone concerned about access to food in the context
of climate change should read it!"
--Clayton Crockett, University of Central Arkansas
"The political, religious, and philosophical thinking surrounding
issues of food production and distribution are of the highest
importance in the face of continued neo-liberal globalization and
the return of nationalisms. Anyone concerned about food justice
should read this book. S. Yael Dennis interrogates the theological
and philosophical understandings of 'sovereignty' and
'anthropology, ' and human-earth relations, bringing nutritional
science into the discussion as well, in order to interrogate the
violence of the contemporary corporate food regimes and lift up the
more egalitarian food regime of the food sovereignty movements,
which recognize that we are all dependent upon (and thus vulnerable
to) the rest of the planetary community which sustains our lives on
a daily basis."
--Whitney Bauman, Florida International University
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