Doctoral Dissertation Research: An Empire of Purity: Making the Modern Sugar Economy

博士论文研究：纯粹的帝国：打造现代糖业经济

• 批准号: 1125858
• 负责人: David Kaiser
• 金额: $ 1.48万
• 依托单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-08-01 至 2014-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1125858&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Empire; Purity

IntroductionThis award supports doctoral dissertation research on changes in the notion of sugar that resulted from new modes of sugar production that were first implemented in the late 19th century. Between 1875 and 1925, in response to massive competitive pressure, the nature of sugar production in the Caribbean and throughout the cane-growing world was radically transformed. New sources and systems of free and coerced labor took the place of slavery, and small animal-powered plantations gave way to huge, technically sophisticated factories. The dramatic political, social, economic, and environmental changes brought by industrialization and centralization have been extensively studied. Yet the most remarkable change of all was perhaps the most subtle, a transformation of the very idea of sugar itself and what it meant for sugar to be pure. Until the end of the nineteenth century, "sugar" denoted a natural substance, something that could only be valued through the knowledge and skill of experienced individuals using all their senses and their judgment. But during the last decades of the 19th century and first decades of the 20th, this kind of evaluation of sugar's quality was superseded in commerce and production by a new concept of value, the chemical determination of its sucrose content. This dissertation explores the effect of this change in the meaning and nature of sugar and purity on the global production, labor, and trade in sugar; and how the sugar economy itself shaped those new ideas of value. Intellectual MeritThe project focuses on two particular economic and intellectual relationships: first between the United States and Cuba, the source of half of US-consumed sugar; and second between Cuba and Glasgow, which provided the heavy equipment and expertise for modern sugar factories in Cuba and around the world. By analyzing published books and journals, factory production records, correspondences, and especially legal and trade disputes, in Cuban, British, and American archives, this project will demonstrate how this shift from sensory to scientific knowledge reshaped the nature of trade, production, and the organization of work in the world of sugar. The project will reconsider commodities and processes of commodification in history. Unlike the mechanical commodification of cotton, wheat, and other well-studied examples, sugar became a globally tradable item through the standardizing power of science. This research will clarify how natural products become globally exchangeable goods, and how that process affects the people and places touched by exchanges. It will use the history of science, especially science and empire, to understand the history of global trade; conversely, it will use the history of commodities and trade to help understand how science is contested and stabilized across vast distances.Potential Broader impactsThis dissertation project will be of interest to scholars of business, economics, and trade as well as to historians of science. In addition to publishing a scholarly book and articles based on the dissertation and delivering presentations at professional scholarly meetings, the Co-PI intends to publish two articles aimed at nonspecialist audiences. These articles would use the sugar example to emphasize challenges facing all modern commodity exchanges, such as determining when dispersed producers, traders, and consumers should trust what they are buying and selling when such trusts depend on scientific measurements made on the far side of the planet.

该奖项支持博士论文研究的糖的概念的变化，导致了新的模式，糖生产，首先在19世纪后期实施。1875年至1925年间，为了应对巨大的竞争压力，加勒比地区和整个甘蔗种植世界的食糖生产性质发生了根本性的变化。自由和强制劳动的新来源和制度取代了奴隶制，小型动物种植园让位于技术先进的大型工厂。工业化和集中化所带来的政治、社会、经济和环境的巨大变化已经得到了广泛的研究。然而，最显著的变化可能也是最微妙的，那就是糖本身的概念以及糖的纯净意味着什么的转变。直到世纪末，“糖”都是指一种天然物质，只有经验丰富的人运用他们所有的感官和判断力，才能通过知识和技能来评估它的价值。但在19世纪的最后几十年和20世纪的前几十年，这种对糖的质量的评估在商业和生产中被一种新的价值概念所取代，这种价值概念是对糖的蔗糖含量的化学测定。本文探讨了糖的意义和性质以及纯度的变化对全球糖生产、劳动和贸易的影响;以及糖经济本身如何塑造了这些新的价值观念。该项目侧重于两个特殊的经济和知识关系：首先是美国和古巴之间的关系，美国消费的一半糖的来源;其次是古巴和格拉斯哥之间的关系，后者为古巴和世界各地的现代糖厂提供重型设备和专业知识。通过分析出版的书籍和期刊，工厂生产记录，信件，特别是法律的和贸易争端，在古巴，英国和美国的档案，这个项目将展示如何从感官到科学知识的转变重塑了贸易，生产的性质，并在世界糖的工作组织。该项目将重新考虑历史上的商品和商品化过程。与棉花、小麦和其他研究充分的例子的机械商品化不同，糖通过科学的标准化力量成为全球可交易的商品。这项研究将阐明天然产品如何成为全球可交换商品，以及这一过程如何影响交换所涉及的人员和地点。它将使用科学的历史，特别是科学和帝国，了解全球贸易的历史;相反，它将使用商品和贸易的历史，以帮助了解科学是如何有争议的，并在广阔的距离稳定。除了出版一本学术书籍和基于论文的文章，并在专业学术会议上发表演讲外，Co-PI还打算出版两篇针对非专业读者的文章。这些文章将使用糖的例子来强调所有现代商品交易所面临的挑战，例如确定分散的生产者，贸易商和消费者何时应该相信他们所买卖的东西，而这种信任取决于地球另一端的科学测量。