hey there, i’m whitney jaye.

I am a farmer, organizer, agrarian artist, memory worker, quilter, banjoist, and mother whose love for the land and sea stem back deep into my life and lineage. My roots are in Wilmington, North Carolina, where the Atlantic Ocean meets the southernmost point of the Cape Fear River, and where my family has been for nine generations. I see my work through the lens of Black Southern lifeways that (re)center agrarianism, and through the ancestral memories and practices of coastal Carolinian culture.

about my work
My food systems and organizing work spans farming, agricultural education, programmatic design, and organizational development and strategy. I have worked for and partnered with organizations including Greening Youth Foundation, Atlanta Botanical Garden, Morehouse School of Medicine, Ashoka Changemakers, and West Atlanta Watershed Alliance to create and implement an array of programs with a focus on environmental literacy and land-based learning. Previously, I served on the Leadership Team of the National Black Food and Justice Alliance (NBFJA), and the Steering Committee of the Southwest Atlanta Growers Cooperative (SWAG).

Today, I serve on the Board of Directors for Boggs Rural Life Center in Keysville, Georgia, am a founding member of the Black Dye Growers Cooperative, and am the farmer/owner of Sunbird Flowers, a small farm producing sustainably grown cut flowers. In 2024, I created Calabash Arts, a memory lab and studio that cultivates space for play, practice, and preservation of the Black agrarian arts. I currently serve as Co-Executive Director of the Southeastern African American Farmers Organic Network (SAAFON), where I guide organizational development, strategy, and programming. My membership affiliations include Alternate ROOTS, the Federation of Southern Cooperatives, and the Brown Sugar Stitchers Quilt Guild (BSSQG).

I deeply love and value the brilliance, spirit, and abundance of Black Southern agrarian magic and have been a witness to its power to transform and heal. May we all be made whole in our pursuit of remembering who and whose we are.