Research Interests
Food Justice; Food Security; Food Inequality; African American Food Systems; African American Studies; Agri-Food Studies; Sociology of Food; Race, Class, and Gender
Education
Ph.D., Development Sociology, Cornell University (2018)
M.S., Agricultural Economics, Cornell University (2013)
B.S. (Summa Cum Laude), Agriculture (Concentration: Agricultural Economics), Prairie View A&M University (2011)
Grants
2017-2019 Engaged Cornell Graduate Student Research Grant, Cornell University. Project: From Civil Rights to Local Food: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on Food Justice.
2017 Graduate Research Grant, American Studies Program, Cornell University.
2017 Engaged Cornell Engaged Opportunity Grant, Cornell University. Project: Farm to Plate Conference: Uniting to Create, Educate, and Celebrate a Sustainable Local Food.
2016 Cornell Engaged Curriculum Grant, Cornell University. Project: Seed to Supper: The Role of the Garden in Community Food Security and Food Justice.
Awards and Honors
2019-2020 Short-Term Fellowship, Special Collections and University Archives, Library of the Health Sciences-Chicago, Richard J. Daley Library, University of Illinois at Chicago
2018 Study the South Research Fellowship, Department of Archives and Special Collections, J. D. Williams Library, University of Mississippi
2017 Medgar and Myrlie Evers Research Scholar-in-Residence, Mississippi Department of Archives and History and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation
2016-2017 Mellon Diversity Seminar Fellow, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Cornell University
Courses Taught
AFRO 298: Civil Rights Pilgrimage (Instructor), Spring 2019
AFRO 224: Race and Food Security (Instructor), Spring 2019
Recent Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles:
Smith II, B. J. (2019). “Mississippi’s War Against the War on Poverty: Food Power, Hunger, and White Supremacy,” Study the South. https://southernstudies.olemiss.edu/study-the-south/ms-war-against-war-on-poverty/
Smith II, B. J. (2019).“Food Justice, Intersectional Agriculture, and the Triple Food Movement,” Agriculture and Human Values. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-019-09945-y
Pendergrastt, T. L., Smith II, B. J., Bezner Kerr, R., and Liebert, J. (2019).“Introduction to the Symposium: Rethinking Food System Transformation: Food Sovereignty, Agroecology, Food Justice, Community Action, and Scholarship,” Agriculture and Human Values. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-019-09952-z
Smith II, B. J. (2019).“Building Emancipatory Food Power: Freedom Farms, Rocky Acres, and the Struggle for Food Justice.”Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, 8(4), 1-11. https://doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2019.084.009
Waller, T., Smith II, B. J.,& Lumumba-Kasongo, E. (2014). The Ronald E. McNair Postbaccalaureate Achievement Program at Cornell University: Survey Results and the Push for Qualitative Research. Journal of College Orientation and Transition, 22,1. https://www.nodaweb.org/page/jcot_fall_2014
Smith II, B. J.,Kaiser, H. M., & Gómez, M. I. (2013). Identifying Factors Influencing a Hospital's Decision to Adopt a Farm-to-Hospital Program. Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, 42(3), 508-517. https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/159225
Other Publications:
Smith II, B. J. (2017). The Greenwood Food Blockade: The White Citizens Council, SNCC and the Politics of Food Access. Winter 2017 Edition of Gravy, No. 66 (Publication of the Southern Foodways Alliance). https://www.southernfoodways.org/the-greenwood-food-blockade/
