From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Michael Pollan (b. 6 February 1955) is a professor of journalism at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is also the director of the Knight Program in Science and Environmental Journalism.

Pollan is a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, a former executive editor for Harper's Magazine, and author of four books: The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (2006), The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World (2001), A Place of My Own (1997), and Second Nature: A Gardener's Education (1991). He is married to painter Judith Belzer.

Pollan received a BA from Bennington College, and continued his studies at Mansfield College at Oxford University and Columbia University, where he earned his master's degree in English and was awarded a President's Fellowship as a PhD student.

His recent work has dealt with the practices of the meat industry, and he has written a number of articles regarding the trends of American agriculture.

He has received the Reuters World Conservation Union Global Awards in environmental journalism, the James Beard Foundation Awards for best magazine series in 2003, and the Genesis Award from the American Humane Association. His articles have been anthologized in Best American Science Writing (2004), Best American Essays (1990 and 2003), and the Norton Book of Nature Writing.

Pollan is the brother of actress Tracy Pollan and the brother-in-law of Michael J. Fox, Tracy's husband.

In his latest book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, Pollan describes what he says are three principal food chains in the United States: the industrial, the organic, and the hunter-gatherer. Pollan follows each of these food chains from a group of plants photosynthesizing calories, through a series of intermediate stages, and ultimately to a meal. Along the way, the author suggests that there is a fundamental tension between the logic of nature and the logic of human industry; that the way we eat represents our most profound engagement with the natural world; and that industrial eating obscures crucially important ecological relationships and connections. On December 10, 2006, the New York Times named The Omnivore’s Dilemma one of the five best nonfiction books of the year.

Pollan's discussion of the industrial food chain is in large part a critique of modern agribusiness. According to Pollan, agribusiness has lost touch with the natural cycles of farming, wherein livestock and crops intertwine in mutually beneficial circles. Pollan's critique of modern agribusiness focuses on what he calls the overuse of corn, for purposes ranging from fattening cattle to massive production of corn oil, high-fructose corn syrup and other corn derivatives. He describes what he sees as the inefficiencies and other drawbacks of factory farming, assesses organic food production and describes what he thinks it is like to hunt and gather food. He blames those who set the rules (i.e., politicians in Washington, D.C., bureaucrats at the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Wall Street capitalists, and agricultural conglomerates like Archer Daniels Midland) for what he calls destructive and precarious agricultural system that have wrought havoc upon the diet, nutrition and well being of Americans. On the other hand, Pollan finds hope in Joel Salatin's farm "Polyface" in Virginia, which he sees as a model sustainable commercial farm.

In Botany of Desire, Pollan explores the concept of co-evolution, specifically of mankind's evolutionary relationship with four plants: apples, tulips, marijuana and potatoes, from the dual perspectives of both humans and the plants themselves. He uses case examples that fit the archetype of four basic human desires, demonstrating how each of these botanical species are selectively grown, bred, and genetically engineered. The apple reflects the desire for sweetness, the tulip beauty, marijuana intoxication, and the potato control. Pollan then unravels the narrative of his own experience with each of the plants, which he then intertwines with a well-researched exploration into their social history. Each section presents a unique element of human domestication, or the "human bumblebee" as Pollan calls us. The stories in each part are varied, often fascinating, even hilarious. These range from the true story of Johnny Appleseed to Pollan's first-hand research with sophisticated marijuana hybrids in Amsterdam, to the alarming and paradigm-shifting possibilities of genetically engineered potatoes.

Official

• MichaelPollan.com - homepage

Pollan essays

• "Unhappy Meals", by Michael Pollan, The New York Times, January 28, 2007
• "An Animal's Place", essay by Michael Pollan, re-printed from The New York Times, January 2003.

Pollan interviews

• "The Cheapest Calories Make You the Fattest", interview by Helen Wagenvoord of Sierra Club, September, 2004.
• "A Plant's-Eye View Of The World", interview by Ketzel Levine, NPR, 2003.