Food History Exhibits

Sipping a Stimulating History: Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate
August 2021 - August 2022

There are good reasons that when scholars study either the history of stimulants or of commodities, tea, chocolate, and coffee are often lumped together as if they had been collectively steeping in a cup for centuries. The leaves and beans from three plants—Camellia sinensis, coffea, theobroma cacao—all converged in Europe at roughly the same time, around the 16th century.

It would be folly to limit the study to such similarities, for tea, chocolate, and coffee each have their own varied and complicated pasts. They may all speak to similar themes—tastes, societal transformations, economics, social power, producer-consumer relationships, definition of the self, and meanings of power—but the paths they took and the nuances that they reveal can be quite different, if we are to consider religion, gender, or meaning. Tea, chocolate, and coffee, rather than having a history, have many fragmented histories, which have developed over time and place. It is in this spirit that we consider these commodities.

They continue to reside in our lives today. They are objects of banal daily habits as well as centerpieces of highly ritualized moments and this against a backdrop of large historical changes of capitalism, industrialism, and geopolitics. In this exhibit we attempt to balance the sweet side of history—convivial, comforting, gustatorial pleasure—with a realistic dose of bitterness—slavery and exploited labor, Imperialism, and "othering"—to illustrate the complex nature of history.

This CIA student-researched exhibit was curated by Professor Beth Forrest’s Food History class as part of the  Applied Food Studies program. Special thanks to Archivist Nicole Semenchuk, Donald and Barbara Tober Foundation, The Hershey Foundation, and all of the patrons that made this exhibit possible.