SAST

063-401/ANTH 063-401
East & West: A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Cultural History of the Modern World
Spring 2018, Lectures - Mon. & Wed. 11:00-11:50 (Fisher-Bennett 419) + Friday Recitation (DRL 3C8)
Professor: Lisa Mitchell TA 402/403: Elliot Montpellier <emontp@sas.upenn.edu>
Office Hours: W 12:00-2:00, and by appt. Office Hours: R 10:00-12:00, and by appt.
Office: 801 Williams Hall TA 404/405: Indivar Jonnalagadda <indivarj@sas.upenn.edu>
Email: lmitch@sas.upenn.edu Office Hours: M 2:00-4:00, and by appt.
Phone: 215-898-6047 TA Office: 447 Williams Hall

Course Description: Sugar and Spices. Tea and Coffee. Opium and Cocaine. Hop aboard the Indian Ocean
dhows, Chinese junks, Dutch schooners, and British and American clipper ships that made possible the rise of
global capitalism, new colonial relationships, and intensified forms of cultural change. How have desires to
possess and consume particular commodities shaped cultures and the course of modern history? This class
introduces students to the cultural history of the modern world through an interdisciplinary analysis of
connections between East and West, South and North. Following the circulation of commodities and the
development of modern capitalism, the course examines the impact of global exchange on interactions and
relationships between regions, nations, cultures, and peoples and the influences on cultural practices and
meanings. The role of slavery and labor migrations, colonial and imperial relations, and struggles for economic
and political independence are also considered. From the role of spices in the formation of European joint stock
companies circa 1600 to the contemporary cocaine trade, the course’s use of both original primary sources and
secondary source readings written by historians, anthropologists, and economists will enable particular
attention to the ways that global trade has impacted social, cultural, and political formations and practices
throughout the world. No pre-requisites. Fulfills Humanities and Social Science (HSS) Sector Requirement and
Cross-Cultural Analysis Foundational Approach.

Learning Objectives – By the end of the semester you should be able to:
• Identify specific connections between the processes of production, circulation, and consumption of
historically important commodities from the 16th century to the present, and trace interrelationships
between processes of cultural change and the development of global capitalism and colonialism.
• Recognize a wide range of theoretical frameworks used in analyzing cross-cultural interactions and
historical change over time (in this class, other classes, and popular media) and hurl appropriate epithets:
“Social Darwinism!” “World Systems Theory!” “Structural Marginalization!” “Commodity Fetishism!”
• Define the concept of “culture,” analyze how changes occur in cultural practices and meanings over time, and
explain why the consumption of particular commodities can take on dramatically different, even opposite,
meanings in different eras and contexts.
• Approach, evaluate, and use primary sources and anthropological data to make reasoned arguments and
effectively intervene within debates about processes of social and cultural change.
• Improve academic listening, notetaking, analytic, research, and citation skills.

Course Requirements (250 points total):
1. Weekly On-line Formative Assessments on Assigned Readings, Attendance, & Participation (100 points)
2. Two Primary Source Exercises (25 x 2 = 50 points)
3. Conceptual Application Research Exercise: Choice of Voiceover Powerpoint or Paper (50 points)
4. Short Final Cumulative Assessment (50 points)

Required Books (Available at the Penn Bookstore, 36th & Walnut):
• Paul Freedman, Out of the East: Spices and the Medieval Imagination (Yale University Press, 2009)
• W. Schivelbusch, Tastes of Paradise: A Social History of Spices, Stimulants, and Intoxicants (Vintage, 1993)
• Sidney W. Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History (Penguin, 1986)
• Pietra Rivoli, The Travels of a T-shirt in the Global Economy, 2nd ed. (Wiley, 2009)

Note on Laptop & Technology Use in Class: Research on laptop use in the classroom has demonstrated more
effective learning when notes are taken by hand. I am therefore asking everyone to put away their phones and
laptops during our time together with the goal of using class time to improve analytic listening and notetaking
skills. For further information, see Robinson Meyer, “To Remember a Lecture Better, Take Notes by Hand,” The
Atlantic, May 1, 2014; and V. Strauss, “Why a leading professor of new media just banned technology use in
class,” Washington Post, Sept. 25, 2014 (available on Canvas).
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Course Readings and Assignments

I. Spices: Early Cultural Interactions between East & West
Wed., Jan. 10 – Introduction: Narratives of World History
• Primary Source: The Journal of the First Voyage of Vasco da Gama to India, pp. 71-84 (Canvas).

Fri., Jan. 12 (Recitation) - Studying History and Culture: Approaches in Historical Social Science
• Eric Ringmar, “Audience for a Giraffe: European Expansionism and the Quest for the Exotic,” Journal of World
History 17:4 (December 2006), pp. 375-397 (Canvas).

Mon., Jan. 15 – NO CLASS (Martin Luther King Jr. Day)

Wed., Jan. 17– The Rise of the West or the Fall of the East? World Systems Theory
• Janet Abu-Lughod, “The Shape of the World System in the Thirteenth Century,” Studies in Comparative
International Development 22:4 (1988), pp. 3-17 (Canvas).

Fri., Jan. 19 (Recitation) – What is “Culture”? Difference and Cross-Cultural Encounters
• Richard Eaton, “Multiple Lenses: Differing Perspectives of Fifteenth-Century Calicut,” Essays on Islam and
Indian History, Oxford University Press, pp. 76-93 (Canvas).

Mon., Jan. 22 – The Allure of Spices
• Freedman, “Spices: A Global Commodity” and “Spices and Medieval Cuisine” (1st half), Out of the East: Spices
and the Medieval Imagination, pp. 1-38.

Wed., Jan. 24 – Structures of Knowledge: How Commodities Come to Mean What They Mean
• Freedman, “Spices and Medieval Cuisine” (2nd half) and “Medicine: Spices as Drugs,” Out of the East: Spices
and the Medieval Imagination, pp. 39-75.

Fri., Jan. 26 (Recitation) – Meet with rare book librarians in VAN PELT LIBRARY
• Freedman, “The Odors of Paradise,” Out of the East, pp. 76-103. (Optional: “Scarcity, Abundance, and Profit,”
pp. 130-145.)

Mon., Jan. 29 – The Fall of Spices
• Freedman, “The Rise and Fall of Spices,” Out of the East: Spices and the Medieval Imagination, pp. 215-226.
• Schivelbusch, “Preface” and “Spices, or the Dawn of the Modern Age”, Tastes of Paradise: A Social History of
Spices, Stimulants, and Intoxicants, pp. xiii-xiv, 3-14.

Wed., Jan. 31 – Comparing Idealist and Materialist Forms of Analysis
• Excerpt from Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, in Stephen Kalberg, ed., Max
Weber: Readings and Commentary on Modernity, pp. 75-83 (Canvas).
• Excerpts from Karl Marx & Frederick Engels, in Robert Antonio, ed., Marx and Modernity, pp. 79-92 (Canvas).

Fri., Feb. 2 (Recitation) – Identifying Analytic Frameworks
• DUE: Primary Source Exercise #1 (Analysis of recipe or ingredient from another time and/or place)

Mon., Feb. 5 – New Tastes in the East
• Sucheta Mazumdar, “The Impact of New World Food Crops on the Diet and Economy of China and India,
1600-1900,” in Raymond Grew, ed., Food in Global History, Westview Press, 1999, pp. 58-78 (Canvas).

II. Sugar: Slavery, Mass Production, and Impacts on Culture
Wed., Feb. 7 – The Production of Sugar
• Mintz, Ch. 2, “Production,” Sweetness & Power, pp. 19-46.

Fri., Feb. 9 (Recitation) – Capitalism and Slavery
• Barbara L. Solow, “Capitalism and Slavery in the Exceedingly Long Run,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History
17:4 (1987), pp. 711-737 (Canvas).
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Mon., Feb. 12 – Capitalism and the Emergence of a Global System of Labor (Solow & Mintz)
• Mintz, finish Ch. 2, “Production,” Sweetness & Power, pp. 46-73.

Wed., Feb. 14 – Consumption: From “Sugar as Spice” to “Sugar and Spice”
• Mintz, Chapter 3, “Consumption,” Sweetness and Power, pp. 74-79 and 108-150. (Optional: pp. 80-108.)

Fri., Feb. 16 (Recitation) – Consumption, Meaning, and Power
• Mintz, Chapter 4, “Power,” Sweetness and Power, pp. 151-186.
• DUE: Proposal for research exercise (with annotations of at least 3 peer-reviewed sources).

III. Cotton: Colonialism, Industrialization, and Deindustrialization
Mon., Feb. 19 – Cotton, Consumption, and the Industrial Revolution
• Woodruff Smith, “Silks & Calicoes” and “Underclothing,” excerpts from the chapter on “Gentility,”
Consumption and the Making of Respectability, New York: Routledge, 2002, pp. 46-62 (Canvas).

Wed., Feb. 21 – The Global Cotton Industry and the U.S.
• Pietra Rivoli, “Prologue” and “Part I: King Cotton,” The Travels of a T-shirt in the Global Economy.

Fri., Feb. 23 (Recitation) – The View from China
• Rivoli, “Part II: Made in China,” The Travels of a T-shirt in the Global Economy

Mon., Feb. 26 – Social Darwinism & Modernization Theory: What Does It Mean to be “Modern”?
• Ali A. Mazrui, “From Social Darwinism to Current Theories of Modernization: Tradition of Analysis,” World
Politics 21:1 (1968): 69-83 (Canvas).
• C. A. Bayly, “The Continuing ‘Riddle of the Modern’,” The Birth of the Modern World, Malden, Mass.: Blackwell
Publishing, 2004, pp. 9-12 (Canvas).

Wed., Feb. 28 – Global Capitalism: Deindustrialization and Anti-Colonial Struggles
• Susan S. Bean, “Gandhi and Khadi, the Fabric of Indian Independence,” in A. Weiner and J. Schneider, eds.,
Cloth and Human Experience, Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991, pp. 355-376 (Canvas).

Fri., Mar. 2 (Recitation) – Gandhi on Technology
• Primary Source: Mohandas K. Gandhi, Excerpt from Hind Swaraj (Canvas).

SPRING BREAK (MARCH 3-11)

Mon., Mar. 12 – Protectionism and Free Markets
• Rivoli, “Part III: Trouble at the Border,” The Travels of a T-shirt in the Global Economy.

Wed., Mar. 14 – And Now to Africa
• Rivoli, “Part IV: My T-Shirt Finally Encounters a Free Market,” The Travels of a T-shirt in the Global Economy.

Fri., Mar. 16 (Recitation) – Travels of a T-Shirt: Review of Key Concepts in Rivoli

IV. Coffee, Tea, and Beverages in Global History
Mon., Mar. 19 – Coffee
• Schivelbusch, “Coffee and the Protestant Ethic,” Tastes of Paradise.

Wed., Mar. 21 – Cocoa, Beer, & Liquor
• Schivelbusch, “Chocolate, Catholicism, Ancien Régime” and “The Industrial Revolution, Beer, and Liquor,”
Tastes of Paradise, pp. 85-95, 147-166.

Fri., Mar. 23 (Recitation) – Ritual and Consumption
• Turner, Victor, “Symbols in African Ritual,” pp. 1100-1105 (Canvas).
• Schivelbusch, “Rituals” and “Drinking Places,” Tastes of Paradise, pp. 167-203

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Mon., Mar. 26 – The Tea Ceremony and the Meanings of Ritual: History vs. Cultural Essence?
• Plutschow, Herbert, “An Anthropological Perspective on the Japanese Tea Ceremony,” Anthropoetics 5:1
(Canvas).
• DUE: Research Exercise

Wed., Mar. 28 – Tea in Colonial Context
• Schivelbusch, “England’s Shift from Coffee to Tea,” Tastes of Paradise, pp. 79-85.
• Lutgendorf, Philip, “Making Tea in India: Chai, Capitalism, Culture,” Thesis Eleven 113:1, (2012) (Canvas).

V. Opium, Marijuana, & Cocaine
Fri., Mar. 30 (Recitation) – Opium and Empire
• John Richards, “Opium and the British Indian Empire: The Royal Commission of 1895,” Modern Asian Studies
36 (May 2002) (Canvas).

Mon., Apr. 2 – Production and Consumption of Opium
• Excerpt from Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies, Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 2008, pp. 83-91 (Canvas).
• Schivelbusch, “The Artificial Paradises of the Nineteenth Century,” Tastes of Paradise, pp. 204-226.

Wed., Apr. 4 – Opium, Race, and the Control of Drugs
• Diana L. Ahmad, “Opium Smoking, Anti-Chinese Attitudes, and the American Medical Community, 1850-
1890,” American Nineteenth Century History 1:2 (Summer 2000), pp. 53-68 (Canvas).

Fri., Apr. 6 (Recitation) – Using Primary Sources: The 1894 Indian Hemp Drugs Commission
and the 1895 Royal Commission on Opium

Mon., Apr. 9 – Science and Capitalism: The Rise of the Drug Industry
• Tim Madge, “Exotica and Enlightenment” and “Divine Plant, Dangerous Ground,” White Mischief: A Cultural
History of Cocaine, New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2001, pp. 33-66 (Canvas). Optional: Freud, “On Coca.”

Wed., Apr. 11 – The Many Meanings of Coca: Use Value, Exchange Value, & Commodity Fetishism
• Catherine J. Allen, “To Be Quechua: The Symbolism of Coca Chewing in Highland Peru,” American Ethnologist
8:1 (1981), pp. 157-167.
• Excerpt from Michael Taussig, My Cocaine Museum, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.

Fri., Apr. 13 (Recitation) – Commodity Chain as Analytic Framework
• Paul Gootenberg, “Cocaine Enchained: Global Commodity Circuits, 1890s-1930s,” Andean Cocaine: The
Making of a Global Drug, The University of North Carolina Press, 2008, pp. 105-141 (Canvas).

Mon., Apr. 16 – From South America to the Streets of New York
• Philippe Bourgois, “Goin’ Legit: Disrespect and Resistance at Work,” In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El
Barrio, 2nd Ed., Cambridge University Press, 2003 (Canvas).

VI. Coal & Oil

Wed., Apr. 18 – Hydrocarbon Man
• Daniel Yergin, Ch. 27, “Hydrocarbon Man,” The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power, 1991, pp. 523-
542 (Canvas).

Fri., Apr. 20 (Recitation) – Review of Key Concepts

Mon., Apr. 23 – Coal, Oil, and Democracy in the Twentieth Century
• Timothy Mitchell, “Carbon Democracy,” Economy and Society 38:3 (2009), pp. 399-432 (Canvas).

Wed., Apr. 25 – Commodities in World History: Results of Voiceover Powerpoint Competition


Cumulative Concept Assessment: Tues., May 1, 9:00-11:00