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Throughout human history, at least up until the 20th Century, this question has had a fairly straightforward answer: the land around us. To ask that question now is to invite all of the confusion and existential anxiety that a post-industrial society can offer, which is why mostly we don’t ask it. Our supermarket shelves are loaded with avocados from California and Mexico, peppers from Peru, and beef from New Zealand; and the labels on each product outnumber the flags from the countries of origin. That’s assuming there are labels at all. If we go out to eat, whether at the fanciest steakhouse or Steak N’ Shake, the source of our dinner remains shrouded in a thick fog of mystery, so potentially shameful that it demands an equally nefarious policy; don’t ask, don’t tell.