Archaeobotanical Evidence of Swahili Cuisine at Unguja Ukuu, Zanzibar

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Food has an integral role in the formation of identity. Archaeobotanical techniques are an underutilized yet productive avenue through which we can understand African cuisines and identities, both past and present. This presentation will focus on the preliminary analysis of the archaeobotanical assemblage excavated from the site of Unguja Ukuu by the Urban Ecology and Transitions of the Zanzibar Archipelago project (UETZAP) in 2019. This research utilizes macro and microbotanical analyses to reconstruct Swahili cuisine(s) in the first millennium CE on the island of Unguja. Unguja Ukuu was one of the earliest and most influential cities on the medieval coast, presenting a compelling opportunity to discern what, why, and how everyday Swahili people were eating and how those habits may have changed. African cuisines have often been portrayed as simplistic or mere starvation foods, with popular conceptions conjuring the image of the “starving African.” The goal of this presentation is not to erase the role of food insecurity in the suffering of African peoples. Rather, it will situate Swahili cuisine(s) and heritage within a deeper history, contribute to understanding the complexity of African cuisines and everyday life, and discuss the interplay between food and identity.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 41641.0