The curse of rainy weather notwithstanding, fair-time is a cracking-good time of year in Fairbanks, one I’ve looked forward to eagerly every year since attending my first way back in 2005. Yeah, I’m a relative new-comer to Alaska, for those who didn’t know. But that first fair made a pretty big impression on me, especially coming from a place and culture so diametrically opposed to Alaska as South Florida. To be fair, there are certainly county- and state-fairs there as well, that is, annually-held carnivals which somehow pass for state fairs. The agricultural aspects of these, though still touted if you dig deep enough on their websites, seem to barely extend beyond petting-zoos and cartoon cows seen on billboard advertisements. Thus, not only did my first Tanana Valley Fair reinforce my certainty that the move to Alaska had been a proper one, it also consoled much personal skepticism that there is still great hope for our food future to be a bright, healthful, and local one.

Strolling through the modern fair’s midway, healthy foodstuffs are not necessarily the first thing you notice, or crave for that matter. How often do we get treated with so many different and decadent configurations of refined flour, sugar, and lard? This is, of course, just a recent addition to fair fare. As we all know, at the heart of this tradition are the display of the foods we raise and grow, and the display of the pride and fulfillment we feel in doing so. Food is what the fair is all about. In fact, the word ‘fair’ has its origin in the middle-English ‘fayre,’ which tellingly is also the root of its homophonetic cousin, ‘fare.’ Also called a fête, festival, agricultural show, or carnival, the fair is a quite old tradition to be sure, with multiple ancient origins likely. Our tradition is closest in form to those of Great Britain, with livestock showing, food and produce competitions, and games of chance the corner-stone attractions. But it seems likely that harvest celebrations, in one form or another, have been happening for as long as there have been harvests.

Unsurprisingly, however, fairs across the country are experiencing changes that move them in one way or another towards the caricatures I experienced in Florida. With the commodification of food has come the commodification of the fair, and where food and agriculture is no longer a sufficiently attractive attraction, it has been supplemented, marginalized, if not replaced, with thrill-rides and marquee-performances, non-profit ventures doing business with for-profit models in an attempt to adapt and survive. Many of the smallest have not been able to make the cut.

The varied vestiges that remain are as testaments to, and artifacts of, the ultimate embodiment and celebration of the relationship between people and food. Food was not just the main attraction of the fair, it was also the social glue that made the fair such a significant and loved event. 4-H, livestock shows and giant cabbages create community, where there is otherwise merely a crowd. At most fairs today it seems that children are merely amused, not educated. Families no longer forge or reinforce long-standing friendships or economic arrangements; rather they increase their isolation from one another as they jostle angrily to be first in line for the new ride or the last cream puff.

But not so here in Fairbanks, and not so, I’m sure, in a great many rural communities throughout the US where I’m happy to report that fayre is alive and well. Though we will, without a doubt, find ourselves jostled once or twice by some impatient parent who is entirely missing the point and the joy of the occasion, these are in the minority. Instead, we see children standing with pride by their prized rabbit, hog, or goat. We see arts, crafts, poetry, and essays that burst with talent. We see families and friends enjoying each other, and yes, we see enormous produce. Maybe I’m projecting, but at that first fair I attended here, and for that matter each year since, it has seemed to me that the celebration was as much about hope and determination, as it was food and tradition: hope that people really can change things from the ground up, and determination to do so.

The fairs in Florida are only as good as the attractions they offer, but fairs like ours are made in celebration by people, not rides. My wife and I like to go more than once to this fair if possible, at very least on canned-food Thursday, where for the modest donation of 4 or more canned food items per person, admission is free. Though modest and unlikely to solve the food security problems we face here in the Interior, the donation seems to me to be in the right spirit.

By the time this hits the stands, we’ll already be winding down from this year’s activities, looking forward to August 2009. I’m not sure how they’ll out-do this year’s witty slogan: “Pirates of the Carrots and Beans,” but when with any luck, some rare sunlight might finally shine on the Tanana Valley Fair. And if not, I don’t think we’ll care.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 15th, 2008 at 3:30 pm by Philip Loring and is filed under Anthropology, Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.