New Introductory Courses in History (200-0-26)

Topic

Drugs and Alcohol in Africa

Instructors

Akin Ogundiran
Akin Ogundiran is the Cardiss Collins Professor of Arts and Sciences, Professor of History, and Courtesy Professor of Anthropology and of Black Studies at Northwestern University. His research interests focus on the political, cultural, economic, and social histories of West Africa from 400 BC to the mid-nineteenth century. Ogundiran’s publications include The Yoruba: A New History (Indiana University Press, 2020), recipient of the Vinson Sutlive Book Prize. He directs the Material History Lab at Northwestern University. He is a Senior Fellow of Gardens and Landscape Studies at Dumbarton Oaks (Washington, DC), a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Meeting Info

University Hall 101: Mon, Wed 9:30AM - 10:50AM

Overview of class

This is the story of the everyday lives in Africa over the past 5000 years, told through drugs and alcoholic beverages—beer, palm wine, tobacco, coffee, kolanut, marijuana, aguardiente, ògógóró, heroin, nyaope, etc. Drugs and alcohol have been central to defining sociality, sacredness, personhood, community, pleasure, and leisure, as well as pain, power, domination, resistance, bondage, and freedom at different times and places. As substances of desire, taste, addiction, and sociality, they are implicated in the process of negotiating, contesting, enacting, and debating identities, belonging, gender, class, and ideas about wellness and illness. What can the production, circulation, and consumption of drugs, alcohol, and other psychoactive substances tell us about Africa's past, present, and future? All the topics in this course are designed to answer this question. For example, the contestation and control over who has the right or privilege to consume which drug or alcohol are tied to the issue of power, identity, and anxieties about social order.

Learning Objectives

Develop skills in primary source analysis and writing a research paper; a deep understanding of the relationships between economics and culture; and the acquisition of proficiency in early modern African history.

Class Notes

History Major Concentration(s): Africa/Middle East
History Minor Concentration(s): Africa, Law and Crime, Economics and Labor, Environment

Class Attributes

Historical Studies Foundational Discipline
Historical Studies Distro Area

Associated Classes

DIS - Harris Hall L28: Fri 9:00AM - 9:50AM

DIS - Kresge Centennial Hall 4-410: Fri 10:00AM - 10:50AM

DIS - Harris Hall L05: Fri 1:00PM - 1:50PM