Hot Sauce and Colonial Degeneracy

Summary

According to Buffon’s theories of colonial degeneracy French individuals residing or born in the Caribbean were subject to the influences of the islands in the form of both climate based adaptation and terroir based alteration.  Foods from the islands, particularly foods which fit the Galenic categories of heat and moisture, were especially damaging, causing otherwise moderate Europeans to become hot blooded, violent, lascivious, and immoderate.  Despite the injunctions to avoid the pollution of rum, spicy food, and indigenous fruits and vegetables, there is evidence in both the archaeological and documentary records that shows that French colonists in the circum-Caribbean manipulated these items and perceptions to create the new social identity of Creole. At the same time people of African and African Creole descent were utilizing hot sauces in symbolic ways to represent throir own agency in folk tales, especially the well-known tales of Bouki and Ti Malice in Saint Domingue.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Archaeology of the French in the New World   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

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Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 257