The Meaning of Local

I sometimes want to call you all. All at once and have a phone party, since you can’t come over for dinner. I want to just hang out and not worry about time or due dates or whether I’m being weird or making a good impression. (For the record, I've been listening to "Tables and Chairs" from Andrew Bird's album, The Mysterious Production of Eggs, over and over again--it somehow is perfect for my current position. Listen to it if you can, or just look at the lyrics here and imagine some beautiful violin music and rock rhythms.)

Unfortunately it’s always very early morning there at the time and that’s no good for phone parties.

… And also, there’s something else. I am becoming an alien. It’s of isolating, learning new things. Mostly my head is full of things no one should probably spend so much time on. Today, for instance, I spent most of the day at a conference about Food Consumption Dilemmas in a Globalized World. We spent over an hour on “The Local.” And I don’t mean the pub down the road. I mean what does “local” mean in terms of food. Is it just about place and if so, how far away can you go and still count as local? And, then someone brought up that it’s really multi-dimensional when we talk about local production and consumption: space/time/matter/knowledge base. Don’t even ask.

This was not for my current studies, mind. You know, those ones where I have a presentation to do on Thursday and another on Monday and two papers due the week after that? (And more, believe it or not, in the next two weeks) No, this conference was because Professor Sabbatical invited me because it’s possibly linked to my dissertation topic. Yep. I chose to go to this thing. And what’s worse----I enjoyed it and felt like I learned something. But how can I possibly call you up and have a normal conversation when my head’s stuck on stupid things like how you define local?

My dissertation topic, by the way, came to me in a flash on a tired Friday night two weeks ago. I hopped up and wrote an outline, even. I won’t tell you here because one of the thousands of my blog readers might steal my topic and publish it first. Or maybe it’s because I’m still shy that it might be useless and academic sounding and put you off. Anyway, it’s about regions and regional identity, and food, and economic development. We’ll see if it stays the same. If it does I might share some more later.

Okay, so, because it’s what’s on my mind, and because I don’t want to isolate myself forever, I’ll tell you what else I’m working on. I have a presentation on Thursday about the Valleys of South Wales and their innovation strategies for economic development. They closed all the coal mines in the ‘80s and can’t seem to keep manufacturing jobs here no matter how cheaply they’re willing to work. And there are tons of low-skilled workers and unemployed. So the Welsh Development Agency and the European Union are dropping all sorts of money into programmes (yep, I spelled it the British way, get over it) to encourage entrepreneurship and innovation in businesses in the area to try and generate jobs, skills and new technology use. The plan involves technology and knowledge “transfer” from local universities into the business community, as well as funding for risk-taking in entrepreneurial ventures and research and development. The idea is to develop a region that shares knowledge and encourages new ways of working for better outcomes. So yeah, that’s one. There’s more to it, email me if you’re interested.

Then, on Monday, I have to give a presentation about the World Bank and whether its practices are living up to its stated commitments to safeguard the environment. I’m researching, among other things, how the World Bank adjusts its energy policies in response to new information and criticism and about the potential for sound environmental projects through the Global Environment Facility and other partnerships. I’m scared to death about this one.

So, um, tell your friends, if they're also my friends, that I posted something. ok. bye. (I first typed "buy" but I don't mean it. Don't buy. Just bye.)