Food, Development & Society Writing Retreat
By Mel Fatric Rhai Yan, Postgraduate Researcher, POLIS Centre for Global Development
On 29th May, alongside my colleagues Cindy Leung (University of York) and Martin Parker (University of Leeds/GFEI Student Ambassador), we hosted a writing retreat designed specifically for PhD students navigating the interdisciplinary themes of food, development, and society. As a PhD student myself, I had previously felt isolated from PhD students who shared similar research topics to me, thus I decided to organise a writing retreat for fellow PhD students. The event brought together 13 participants from 4 universities within Yorkshire – particularly the University of Leeds, University of York, Bradford University and Sheffield Hallam University – who are working on various writing projects under the broad theme of “food, development & society”.
The writing retreat was held at the Nigel Bertram Visitor Centre of the University of Leeds Research Farm through the support of the White Rose Doctoral Training Partnership (WRDTP) and the Global Food and Environment Institute (GFEI).
The primary aim of the event was to provide participants with a conducive and supportive space for writing, be it a chapter of the thesis or a paper for an academic conference. This is noting how we often set aside writing because of the many other tasks and responsibilities that we need to take on as a PhD student. The session primarily consisted of three focused writing periods with breaks in between, providing some structure to how we can effectively muddle through the daunting task of organising our ideas into coherent sentences. Despite being the retreat facilitator, I was also able to finish a section of my paper in just half a day. This is a feat that has often been unattainable for me when working alone at home or in the office, given all the distractions. Of course, we also took the opportunity to get to know each other’s research projects whilst doing a leisurely walk around some parts of the farm.
The chance to gather PhD students within my broader discipline has been a surreal experience. I remember attending a GFEI gathering of academics from the University of Leeds - Faculty of Social Sciences a few months ago and discovering that I was the only PhD student present. I recall asking the group: Where are the others? - Realising that my work on food sovereignty was the only PhD research featured in the Faculty’s news article for the Word Food Day last year further sparked my curiosity. The writing retreat was therefore a fulfillment of a self-imposed mission to find other PhD students with a shared interest in social science and food and connect with them.
From a broader academic standpoint, technology-driven solutions or methodologies seem to be dominating the way we understand and address food (in)security based on my personal observations of the topics of the regular webinars organised by the GFEI. Whilst the implications of these studies for improving agricultural productivity or advancing food science are very crucial, issues like social inequalities or political conflicts in food production, distribution, exchange, and consumption also require equal attention. As a social scientist, I am happy that I met people who are interested in expanding their perspective of food systems beyond the boundaries of their academic disciplines and methodological approaches.
Following this successful retreat, the group has decided to continue the conversation and to support each other in further strengthening the interdisciplinarity of food research. Hence, we will be convening a Food, Development & Society Research Network by the end of June to provide a platform for PhD students and Early Career Researchers to engage in knowledge exchange on the various ways by which food systems can be examined and their implications for understanding society and its ‘development’.
If you would be interested to join this network, please contact Mel: pt19mfrr@leeds.ac.uk