Kill in the City to Save the Fields: How the Urban Uncanny Refracts the Violence of Agrarian California

Keywords: urban uncanny, urban political ecology, violence, California, industrial agriculture
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Saturday
Session Start / End Time: 2/26/2022 11:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/26/2022 12:40 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 1

Abstract

California’s industrial agriculture has operated at scale for the purposes of capitalist accumulation since the state’s incorporation into the U.S., resulting in a long history of slow and structural violence in agrarian communities. State agents argue that eradicating pests in cities before they reach production areas will prevent the intensification of already-present structural violence (by minimizing pesticide use). This paper focuses on urban residents’ experiences of three controversial projects to eradicate: (1) the Mediterranean fruit fly (Ceratitis capitata) by spraying malathion from helicopters in Los Angeles (1981-1996), (2) the light brown apple moth (Epiphyas postvittana) by spraying a pheromone slurry from airplanes over Santa Cruz and Monterey (2007-2010), and (3) Japanese beetle (Popillia japonica) by spraying conventional pesticides in yards in a Sacramento suburb (2011-2016). I argue that the fast violence of spectacular pest management events in urban and suburban areas refracts the slow violence that is routinized in California’s agrarian landscapes. This refraction is made possible by the visceral reaction of urban residents to these high profile eradication projects. To describe urban residents’ experience, I use Kaika’s concept of the “urban uncanny,” which occurs when the urban metabolism breaks down and becomes visible. In moments of “urban uncanny,” urban residents’ sense of safety and independence is threatened when the state insists that their day-to-day environments are part of the metabolic functioning of industrial farms. Framing urban encounters with agricultural pest eradication methods as “urban uncanny” highlights how sensory encounters stoke political reactions from bourgeois households to (agri-)environmental problems.