Social Lives of Rice

Black Rice is a fascinating history of the origins of rice cultivation in the American colonies, especially South Carolina and Georgia. In many ways, it is similar to Mintz’s work on sugar, though Carney does not make as significant a historical claim for rice like Sweetness and Power does for sugar.  It is also the first book to make the production side of the life of a commodity its entire focus, as its argument is based around the importation of culturally significant production models centered on a central cereal crop. Unfortunately, leaving the steps following the processing out of the book leaves unanswered questions for the reader. One of these questions is what, exactly, drove the demand for rice. Carney mentions that the plantation owners wanted to get their rice to European markets before and around Lent, but there is no explanation for why this was the case. Given how central the time demands of that market requirement are in her argument of how the gendered labor division of rice production was broken down, I would have expected a more significant explanation.

Carney herself once again seems to be functioning under the economic definition of commodity and commodity exchange – which helps to explain her statement that rice is “one of the first” commodities to be traded in a world market. Given the long trade exchanges that existed for products like spices and silk long before the Modern period, the statement seems absurd otherwise. Nevertheless, I would describe this work as a commodity history myself; albeit one that only discusses part of the life of a commodity. I agree with Daniel in that it accomplishes this in spite of the fact that its argument is primarily about cultural exchange, because the thing that is exchanged (in Carney’s argument) is the social position and life of rice.