Required Readings
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Cullather, Nick. The Hungry World: America's Cold War Battle Against Poverty in Asia. Harvard University Press, 2010. ISBN: 9780674050785. [Preview with Google Books]
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Mintz, Sidney. Sweetness & Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History. Penguin Books, 1986, or newer edition. ISBN: 9780140092332.
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White, Richard. The Organic Machine: The Remaking of the Columbia River. Hill and Wang, 1996. ISBN: 9780809015832.
Suggested Readings
- Tise, Larry. "Why Is Our Thanksgiving Bird Called a Turkey?" History News Network, November 2008.
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Douglass, Frederick. Excerpts from chapters 6–7 in The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass. Dover Publications, 2003.[Preview with Google Books] [Excerpt]
Key
[P] = Primary Source Reading
[S] = Secondary Source Reading
SES # | TOPICS | READINGS |
---|---|---|
1 | Introduction | [P] ![]() |
2 | Modern Ingredients |
[S] [S] [S] Norton, Marcy. "Tasting Empire: Chocolate and the European Internalization of Mesoamerican Aesthetics." The American Historical Review 111, no. 3 (2006): 660–91. |
3 | Factories in the Fields |
[P] [S] Hahamovitch, Cindy. "Creating Perfect Immigrants: Guestworkers of the World in Historical Perspective 1." Labour History 44, no. 1 (2003): 69–94. [S] Films: Black Sugar. Directed by Hank Friedmann. Color, 12 min. 1988 or The Price of Sugar. Directed by Bill Hany. Color, 90 min. 2007. |
4 | Food Factories |
[P] [P] [S] |
5 | American Agriculture |
[S] [S] Freidberg, Susanne E. Triumph of the Egg. Comparative Studies in Society and History 50, no. 2 (2008): 400–23. [S] Howard-Smith, Kendra. "Antibiotics and Agricultural Change: Purifying Milk." Agricultural History 84, no. 3 (2010): 327–51. Film: King Corn. Directed by Aaron Woolf. Color, 88 min. 2007. |
6 | What (Not) to Eat |
[S] Shapin, Steven. "Trusting George Cheyne: Scientific Expertise, Common Sense, and Moral Authority in Early Eighteenth-Century Dietetic Medicine." Bulletin of the History of Medicine 77, no. 2 (2003): 263–97. [S] [S] [S] ———. "Looks Like Meat, Smells Like Meat, Tastes Like Meat." Food, Culture and Society: An International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research 15, no. 1 (2012): 113–28. |
7 | Abundance |
[P] [P] [S] [S] Nunn, Natha and Qian, Nancy. "The Potato's Contribution to Population and Urbanization: Evidence from a Historical Experiment." Quarterly Journal of Economics 126, no. 2 (2011): 593–650. |
8 | Individual Meetings to Discuss Paper Proposal | No new readings assigned. |
9 | Hunger |
[S] Jacobs, Meg. "How About Some Meat?: The Office of Price Administration, Consumption Politics, and State Building from the Bottom Up, 1941–1946." The Journal of American History 84, no. 3 (1997): 910–41. [S] |
10 | Supermarkets |
[S] Hamilton, Shane. "The Economies and Conveniences of Modern-Day Living: Frozen Foods and Mass Marketing, 1945–1965." The Business History Review 77, no. 1 (2003): 33–60. [S] Araiza, Lauren. "In Common Struggle against a Common Oppression: The United Farm Workers and the Black Panther Party, 1968–1973." The Journal of African American History 94, no. 2 (2009): 200–23. [S] |
11 | American Cuisine |
[P] "The Oriental Grill Menu (1916)" & "Ship's Service Menu, Guantanamo Bay (1946)" [P] [S] Russek, Audrey. "Appetites without Prejudice: U. S. Foreign Restaurants and the Globalization of American Food Between the Wars." Food and Foodways: Explorations in the History and Culture of Human Nourishment 19, no. 1–2 (2011): 34–55. [S] |
12 | Nature |
[S] Soluri, John. "Accounting for Taste: Export Bananas, Mass Markets, Panama Disease." Environmental History 7, no. 3 (2002): 386–410. [S] Boyd, William. "Making Meat: Science, Technology, and American Poultry Production." Technology and Culture 42, no. 4 (2001): 631–64. [S] |
13 | Novelty and Tradition |
[P] Portinari, Folco. "Slow Food Manifesto." December 10, 1989. [S] Paxson, Heather. "Cheese Cultures: Transforming American Tastes and Traditions." Gastronomica 10, no. 4 (2010): 35–47. [S] Bilger, Burkhard. "Squirrel and Man." The New Yorker, July 2000, 58. [S] |
14 | Potluck | No new readings assigned. |