Farm: A Multimodal Reader, Kinkead Joyce, Funda Evelyn, McNeill Lynne S.

In the text, readers are guided through the Jeffersonian idealism of the yeoman farmer (cultivators of the earth are the chosen people of God) to literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Thoreaus The Bean-Field, Cathers prairie trilogy, Steinbecks The Grapes of Wrath, and Carpenters Farm City). Contributors provide historical context for the literary texts, such as discussion of sharecropping vs. plantation systems, the rise of agribusiness and chemical farming, and Teddy Roosevelts Country Life Commission. Written, visual, and oral texts ask readers to consider the farm in art (Grant Wood), ecology (Rachel Carsons Silent Spring), childrens and young adult literature (classic childrens books, YA novels, nonfiction, and poetry), advertising (from early boosterism to Chipotle videos), print culture (farmers market and victory garden posters from both world wars), folklore (food culture, vintners, and veterinarian practices), popular culture (Farm Aid concerts), and much more. Each reading is supported by activities, exercises, projects, and visual rhetorical elements that further connect students to agriculture and the essential work of farmers.