Submissions for our next anthology, Sprouts, are due in less than a month! Haven’t found a topic yet? Here are a few ideas to get the wheels turning:
Try searching for any of these terms in combination with place names near you: agribusiness, agriculture, baked bean dinner, church dinner, community garden, community kitchen, CSA (community-supported agriculture), dairy, farm, farmer(s), farmer’s market, fish, food bank, food co-op, food festival, food justice, food processing, food preservation, food production, food security, fruit, garden(ing), GMOs (genetically-modified organisms), grain, harvest festival, herbs, heirloom varieties, honey, hunger, hunting, local food, locavore / localvore, meat, organic farming, pancake breakfast, permaculture, potluck, seasonal eating, seed saving, soil building, soil degradation, traditional food/meal, vegetables, wild edibles. In addition to these terms, try specific types of food (alone and in combination with “festival”). I’ve no doubt missed lots of rich topics, so suggest some in the comments.
Check out these links for possible inspiration:
- YES! Magazine on food – lots of relevant articles, and the way they approach stories provides good examples to follow. That link is to search results – if it doesn’t work, just enter “food” in their search box (here’s the main page). Don’t adapt their articles without permission. Do use as one of several sources, or to gather ideas about what kind of local projects to look for.
- Post Oil Solutions – a group based in Brattleboro, VT that has a lot of cool food projects. You could do a story about them or one of their projects, or use their list as a guide to types of projects to look for in your own area (one example: they’ve acquired an EBT reader so people on food benefits can shop at the farmer’s market).
- Kitchen Gardeners International – blog posts on the whys and hows of gardening, plus links to local groups.
- This article on changing the law to allow more sales of homemade food is about California, but I’m pretty sure this is or has been an active issue in our region.
We’ll post some advice about some general ways you might approach your comic shortly; in the meantime, good luck and we look forward to seeing your comics!