Anna Blythe Lappé
Anna Lappé is a national bestselling author and sought-after public speaker, respected for her work on sustainability, food politics, globalization, and social change. Named one of Time’s “eco” Who’s-Who, Anna has been featured in The New York Times, Gourmet, O: The Oprah Magazine, Domino, Food & Wine, Body + Soul, Natural Health, and Vibe, among many other publications.
Anna is a founding principal, with her mother Frances Moore Lappé, of the Cambridge-based Small Planet Institute, an international network for research and popular education about the root causes of hunger and poverty. The Lappés are also co-founders of the Small Planet Fund, which has raised more than $500,000 for democratic social movements worldwide, two of which have won the Nobel Peace Prize since the Fund’s founding in 2002.
Anna is a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio and appears frequently on television, from PBS to the CBC in Canada and FoxNews. Anna is the host for MSN’s Practical Guide to Healthy Living and is a co-host for the public television series, The Endless Feast. She can also be seen as a featured expert on Howdini.com; the Sundance Channel’s Big Ideas for a Small Planet; and the PBS documentary, Nourish: Food + Community. She has been on hundreds of radio programs, including National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition, The Diane Rehm Show, Talk to America, and WNYC’s Brian Lehrer Show and Leonard Lopate Show.
Since 2002, Anna has participated in more than three hundred events, from community food festivals to university lectures. She has been a featured speaker at dozens of colleges and universities, including Boston College, Brown University, Columbia University, Dominican University, Northwestern University, Wesleyan, and Yale University, among many others.
Anna’s first book Hope’s Edge: The Next Diet for a Small Planet (Tarcher/Penguin 2002), co-written with her mother Frances Moore Lappé, chronicles courageous social movements around the world. Winner of the Nautilus Award for Social Change, Hope’s Edge has been published in several languages and is used in dozens of classrooms, from Telluride to Toronto to Tokyo.
Called “ingenious” by The New York Times, Anna’s second book Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen (Tarcher/Penguin 2006) showcases the ecological and social benefits of sustainable food and brings this diet to life with the seasonal menus of chef Bryant Terry.
Anna’s writing has been published in The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, International Herald Tribune, and Canada’s Globe and Mail. Anna is also a contributing author to Food Inc., WorldChanging: A User’s Guide to the 21st Century, and Feeding the Future: How the Battle over Food Will Change Your Life.
Her writing and advocacy has earned Anna numerous recognitions. She was named one of the nation’s leading environmental changemakers by Organic Style magazine and in 2006 was selected for Contribute magazine’s “21 Under 40 Making a Difference.” In 2007, Anna was chosen by the Missing Peace Project for the Compassion in Action Award.
Anna earned an M.A. in Economic and Political Development from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and graduated with honors from Brown University. From 2004 to 2006, she was a Food and Society Policy Fellow with the WK Kellogg Foundation. She is currently a Senior Fellow with the Oakland Institute.
She lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and their daughter, Ida.
Her third book, Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It, will be published in April 2010 by Bloomsbury.
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CONSULTING:
Anna offers consulting services on fundraising, strategic planning, and media and outreach and has worked with foundations, non-profits, and community groups. She has been an editorial consultant for publications including The Nation and World Ark magazine.
Anna has served as:
- Consultant for conferences about food and farming, including serving on the planning committee for the Food and Society Conference of the WK Kellogg Foundation (Spring 2005) and advising a Columbia University School of Journalism Food Forum (January 2006)
- Consulting editor for The Nation’s special issue on food (Fall 2006)
- Consultant to the Women Donor’s Network Action Fund on media reform (2005-2006)
- Jury member for MediaRights Film Festival (2004)
- Free Range Studios
- Heifer International
- The Nation magazine for The Nation Institute
- WK Kellogg Foundation
- World Ark magazine for Heifer International
- World Hunger Year
ADVISORY POSTS AND BOARDS:
- Anna serves informally in an advisory capacity to a number of grassroots media organizations and documentary films. In addition, she served on the Advisory Council to the LightBox Theater Company Food Project (2006), as advisor for a Small Planet Institute event series with (2005), and as advisor to the Active Element Foundation(2003-2004), the League of Young Voters (2004), and the Green Gourmet television pilot.
- Anna is an active board member of the Center for Media and Democracy , and a former board member of the Community Food Security Coalition (2005-2006) and b-healthy (Build Healthy Eating and Lifestyles to Help Youth), a New York City-based non-profit organization (2004-2006)
- Anna is also a proud board member of Rainforest Action Network
RESEARCH AND INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATIONS:
- Community Food Security Coalition Bridging Borders, Vancouver (2006)
- Grub Research: Missouri, Upstate New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Nevada, various cities in California, and more. (2004-2005)
- Food and Society Policy Fellowship Research trips:
- Sustainable agriculture in Hawaii (2006)
- Urban community food renewal in Minnesota (2005)
TEACHING AND SCHOLARLY POSITIONS
- Anna has guest lectured at numerous colleges and universities around the country, including the Gallatin School at NYU, Yale University, and Eckerd College in Florida.
- Anna has conducted a number of workshops, including a workshop with Heifer International staff at their Little Rock headquarters and a weekend workshop at The Marguerite Center near Ottawa, Canada.
Anna offers a range of workshops about food systems and social change for laypeople and educators alike. Workshops range from one day to three days.
Workshops include:
• Feeding Your Soul, Feeding Sustainability: A women’s weekend with Anna Lappé and friends
• Pushing the Edge of Possibility: Lessons from Social Movements around the World
• Decoding the Cornucopia: Charting Your Escape from Food Overwhelm
Past workshop sites include:
• Hollyhock, Cortes Island Canada
• Kripalu, Massachusetts
• Marguerite Center, Ottawa, Canada
• Omega Institute, New York
• The Crossings, Texas
PARTICIPATION IN PUBLIC AFFAIRS CAMPAIGNS AND ADVOCACY & PARTNERSHIPS
The Institute has given its support to many critical pro-democracy campaigns, some of which are detailed below. Anna Lappe has done so via:
- Various policy change projects through the Food and Society Policy Fellowship with the WK Kellogg Foundation (2004 to 2006)
- Public testimony in support of the New York City Board of Health proposals to ban trans fats and require restaurant chains to post calories on menu boards. (2006)
- Public testimony for New York State Legislation on proposed genetically engineered seed labeling and liability laws. (2006)
- Public testimony for the US Farm Bill Listening Tour. (2006)
[Photo of Anna © 2008 Bart Nagel | http://www.bartnagel.com ]