Research

In her book, The New American Farmer: Immigration, Race, and the Struggle for Sustainability (MIT Press 2019), Minkoff-Zern explores the experiences of Latino/immigrant farmers as they transition from farmworkers to farm owners, offering a new perspective on racial inequity and sustainable farming. She argues that immigrant farmers, with their knowledge and experience of alternative farming practices, are—despite a range of challenges—actively and substantially contributing to the movement for an ecological and sustainable food system. This book is the culmination of over eight years of research across five regions of the United States.

Dr. Minkoff-Zern is currently involved in two new research projects. The first project looks at the labor and health conditions of government-contracted (H-2A) guestworkers workers in U.S. agriculture. This project is a mixed-method collaboration with scholars from Syracuse and Cornell Universities from Public Health Economics and Rural Sociology. Combining in-depth interviews with quantitative analysis of government data, this project investigates the conditions and experiences of agricultural guestworkers, as well as farmers, who use the program throughout the Northeast region. In a second project, she is collaborating with colleagues in the departments of Public Health and Marriage and Family Therapy, looking at refugee gardening, mental health, and food sovereignty. This innovative study is advancing understandings of gardening as a moderator for reducing racial and ethnic health disparities, particularly among those who have been subjected to systemic violence or trauma.

Recent Publications


Books
———————————————————
Forthcoming 2024. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Mares, Teresa. Will Work for Food: Labor Across the Food Chain. University of California Press.

2019. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. The New American Farmer: Immigration, Race, and the Struggle for Sustainability. M.I.T. Press.


Peer Reviewed Articles in Professional Journals
———————————————————
2023. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Walia, Bhavneet, Gangamma, Rashmi, and Zoodsma, Anna. “Food Sovereignty and Displacement: Gardening for Food, Mental Health, and Community Connection.” Journal of Peasant Studies. Early Online August 10, 2023.

2022. Zoodsma, Anna, Dudley, Mary Jo, & Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. National food security, immigration reform, and the importance of worker engagement in agricultural guestworker debates. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, 11(4), 1–13.

2022. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Mary Jo Dudley, Anna Zoodsma, Bhavneet Walia, and Rick Welsh. “Protracted Dependence and Unstable Relations: Agrarian Questions in the H-2A Visa Program.” Journal of Rural Studies. 93: 43-45.

2021.Goldberg, Hanna and Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern. “Teaching Labor in Food Studies: Challenging Consumer-Based Approaches to Social Change Through Community-Engaged Student Research.” Food, Culture, and Society. Early Online Access.

2021. Anelyse M. Weiler, Kathleen Sexsmith and Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern. “Parallel Precarity: A Comparison of U.S. and Canadian Agricultural Guest Worker Programs.” International Journal of Sociology of Agriculture and Food. 26 (2): 143-163.

2020. Sbicca, Josh, Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern and Shelby Coopwood. ““Because they are connected”: Linking structural inequalities in farmworker organizing.” Human Geography. 13 (3): 263-276.

2020. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Rick Welsh, and Maizy T. Ludden. “Immigrant Farmers, Sustainable Practices: Growing Ecological and Racial Diversity in Alternative Agrifood Spaces.” Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems. 44 (7): 947-972.

2018. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Race, Immigration, and the Agrarian Question: Farmworkers Becoming Farmers in the United States.” The Journal of Peasant Studies. Volume 45 (2): 389-408.

2017. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Welsh, Rick. “The Difference Between the Vaccine and the G.M.O. Food Debates.” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems. Vol 32(5): 387-388.

2017. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “The Case for Taking Account of Labor in Sustainable Food Systems in The United States.” Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems. Volume 32(6): 576-578.

2017. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Sea Sloat. “A New Era of Civil Rights?: Latino Immigrant Farmers and Exclusion at the United States Department of Agriculture.” Agriculture and Human Values. Volume 34 (3): 631-643.

2016. Levkoe, Charles Z, McClintock, Nathan, Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Coplen, Amy K., Gaddis, Jennifer, Lo, Joann, Tendick-Matesanz, Felipe, and Weiler, Anelyse. “Forging Links Between Food Chain Labor Activists and Academics.” Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. Special Issue on Labor in the Food System. Volume 6 (2).

2015. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Megan Carney. “Latino Im/migrants, “Dietary Health,” and Social Exclusion: A Critical Examination of Nutrition Interventions in California.” Food, Culture, and Society. Volume 18 (3).

2014. Minkoff-Zern. Laura-Anne. “Subsidizing Farmworker Hunger: Food Assistance Programs, Farmworker Gardens, and the Social Reproduction of California Farm Labor.” Geoforum. Volume 57.

2014. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Hunger Amidst Plenty: Farmworker Food Insecurity and Coping Strategies in California.” Local Environment: The International Journal of Justice and Sustainability. Special issue on Interstitial and Subversive Food Spaces. Volume 19 (2).

2014. Brahinsky, Rachel, Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern, and Jade Sasser. “Race, Space, and Nature: An Introduction and Critique.” Introduction to guest edited special issue. Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography. Volume 46 (5).

2014. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Knowing “Good Food”: Immigrant Knowledge and the Racial Politics of Farmworker Food Insecurity.” Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography. Special Edited Volume on Race, Space, and Nature. Volume 46 (5).

2014. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Challenging the Agrarian Imaginary: Farmworker-Led Food Movements and the Potential for Farm Labor Justice.” Human Geography. 18 Volume 7 (1).

2012. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Pushing the Boundaries of Indigeneity and Agricultural Knowledge: Oaxacan Immigrant Community Gardening in California.” Agriculture and Human Values. Volume 29 (3).


Edited Book Chapters
———————————————————
2020. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Sea Sloat. “Labor and Legibility: Mexican Immigrant Farmers and Resource Access at the United States Department of Agriculture.” In Agyeman, J. and S. Giacalone (eds). The Immigrant-Food Nexus: Borders, Labor, and Identity in North America. M.I.T. Press.

2017. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Farmworker-Led Food Movements Then and Now: The United Farmworkers, The Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the Potential for Farm Labor Justice.”  In Alkon, A. and J. Guthman (eds). The New Food Activism: Opposition, Cooperation, and Collective Action. University of California Press.

2017. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Crossing Borders, Overcoming Boundaries: Latino Immigrant Farmers and a New Sense of Home in the United States.” In Food Across Borders: Production, Consumption and Boundary Crossing in North America. Melanie Dupuis, Don Mitchell, and Matthew Garcia, Eds. Rutgers University Press.

2011. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Nancy Peluso, Jennifer Sowerwine and Christy Getz. “Race and Regulation: Asian Immigrants in California Agriculture.” In Cultivating Food Justice: Race, Class and Sustainability. Alison Alkon and Julian Agyeman, eds. M.I.T. Press.

2010. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Agribusiness.” In Green Food, An A-to-Z Guide, Dustin J. Mulvaney and Paul Robbins, eds. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications.


Book Reviews
———————————————————
2020. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. A Review of “Wilted: Pathogens, Chemicals, and the Fragile Future of the Strawberry Industry.” Gastronomica: The Journal for Food Studies. Vol 20 (2): 112–113.

2013. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. A Review of “Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farmworkers in the United States.” Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography. Online.

2013. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. A Review of “Free Food For All: Fixing School Food In America”, Food and Foodways: Explorations in the History and Culture of Human Nourishment, Vol 21 (2): 156-158.


Professional Papers/Popular Press
———————————————————
2022. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne, Gangamma, Rashmi, Walia, Bhavneet & Zoodsma, Anna. Refugee Gardening: An Opportunity to Improve Economic Conditions, Food Security, and Mental Health. Population Health Research Brief Series. 198.

2020. Bellows, Anne, Rick Welsh, Evan Weissman, Mary Kiernan, Lynn Brann, Kay Stearns Bruening, Nichole Marie Beckwith, Chaya Charles, Elissa Johnson, Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern, Tanya Horacek, Sudha Raj, Jessica Redmond, Nancy Rindfuss, Jane Uzcategui, Margaret Voss and Jennifer Wilkins. “From farm to factory to table, coronavirus pandemic challenges US food system.” Commentary. Syrascue.com.

2017. Minkoff-Zern-Laura-Anne, Charles Levkoe, Levi Van Sant, Laura Johnson, Joshua Sbicca, Courtney Gallaher, Colleen Hammelman, Daniel Block, and Russell Hedberg. “Uncertain Future for U.S. Food System.” Op. Ed. Finger Lakes Times.

2015. Minkoff-Zern, Jonah and Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Citizen’s United Ruling; A Dangerous Expansion of Corporate Power in the U.S.” Right to Food and Nutrition Watch: People’s Nutrition is Not a Business. F.I.A.N. International (7), 28.

2013. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Care about Your Food? Then Care about Your Farmworkers Too.” YES Magazine. Online Jan 30, 2013. Reprinted in 2013. Menu For the Future. Northwest Earth Institute.

2013. Meade, Sarah and Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne. “Market Offers Wealth of Tradition—and Veggies—for Immigrant Farmers and Shoppers.  Online Oct 7, 2013.

2011. Minkoff-Zern, Laura-Anne and Christy Getz. “Farmworkers- The Basis and Bottom of the Food Chain.” Race, Poverty, and the Environment. Vol 18. No 1.

2007. Gillon, Sean, Minkoff, Laura-Anne, and Thistlethwaite, Rebecca. “Grounding Ourselves: Innovative Land Tenure Models in California and Beyond.”  California Food and Justice Network Working Paper.  Community Food Security Coalition. Reprinted 2008. In Farmer’s Guide to Securing Land. Sebastopol, California: California Farmlink.

2004. Minkoff, Laura-Anne. Local and Alternative Practices for Soil Fertility in San Lucas Tolimán, Guatemala. Resource document for The Mesoamerican Institute for Permaculture (I.M.A.P.), San Lucas Tolimán, Guatemala.

2004. Minkoff, Laura-Anne. Land Ownership in Guatemala. Resource document for The Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (N.I.S.G.U.A.), Washington D.C.