ABSTRACT
Chapter 5, Degraded Bodies, Degraded Earth: I read Berry’s self-reflective essay, The Hidden Wound (2010a) on the legacy of slavery within his own family history, and his analysis of intersecting violence to the human body and spirit as well as to the land via racism. Central to Berry’s analysis of racism is his recognition of the degradation of land via work that is seen as beneath those who would name themselves white. This compounding of degradations is traced north to industrial Detroit via the Great Migration, and into Detroit’s “50-year Rebellion” (Kurashige, 2017). And finally, Berry’s own agrarian values are found in the once abandoned lots and parks, where a growing Black Community Food Security Network is reclaiming the land and the Black body as sites of self-determination and love.
