Local: The New Face of Food and Farming in America

Featuring stunning visuals and more than 200 agricultural terms and their definitions as described by today's leaders in food and farming, The Lexicon of Sustainability showcases and explores the rapidly growing subculture of sustainable farming in America. When Douglas Gayeton took his young daughter to see salmon jumping-a favorite pastime he used to do as a boy in Seattle-he was devastated to find that the salmon population was all but gone due to water pollution. Since then, he has made it his mission to travel around the country, photographing and learning the new language of sustainability from today's foremost practitioners in food and farming in the hopes of educating people on how to lead a more sustainable and healthier lifestyle. Thus began the Lexicon of Sustainability, a project that promotes organic living and educates people on how to make a positive impact on the world. The Lexicon of Sustainability-a working title-is the book component of this massive crowd-sourcing project. For the past three years, Gayeton has traveled the country, interviewing and photographing leaders-Alice Waters, Wes Jackson, Temple Gradin, and John Mackey, to name few-in the sustainability movement, as well as everyday farmers, fisherman, and dairy producers to better understand American food and farming today. Their insights, along with stunning collage-like photography serve as the core of this book, in which Gayeton isolates and de-mystifies over 300 terms-words like "food miles"; "locavore"; "organic"; "fish farm"; "hormone free"-in an accessible and meaningful way. Each chapter opens with a personal essay by Gayeton, detailing an aspect of his journey into the heartland of America, and follows with a comprehensive collection of terms, accompanied by Gayeton's beautiful four-color photographs. In addition, there will be running interviews throughout the book with the various leaders and individuals Gayeton has spoken to, as well as sidebars that offer "eco tips" and other examples/info on how the sustainable movement affects the reader on a daily level. The Lexicon of Sustainability educates, engages, and inspires people to pay closer attention to how they eat, what they buy, and where their responsibility begins for creating a healthier, safer food system in America. And it all begins with learning a few words.