Adaptive Memories Lab
Adaptive Memories Lab
The Aromas, Spices & Memories project investigates the colonial history of taste in the Indian Ocean world. Spices such as cinnamon, clove, pepper, nutmeg, and sugar moved through imperial routes that transformed both ecologies and the human sensorium. Colonial cuisines were sites of extraction and appropriation as well as laboratories of adaptive memory, where biology, necessity, and nostalgia intertwined.
The Aromas, Spices & Memories project investigates the colonial history of taste in the Indian Ocean world. Spices such as cinnamon, clove, pepper, nutmeg, and sugar moved through imperial routes that transformed both ecologies and the human sensorium. Colonial cuisines were sites of extraction and appropriation as well as laboratories of adaptive memory, where biology, necessity, and nostalgia intertwined.
Sailors and settlers improvised recipes to survive foreign climates: brewing beer in tropical heat, fermenting foods for safety, or infusing gin with quinine to prevent malaria. These acts of sensory adaptation were also acts of emotional continuity, attempts to recreate the taste of home under new skies. The resulting hybrids formed the foundations of modern global taste and cuisine.
Sailors and settlers improvised recipes to survive foreign climates: brewing beer in tropical heat, fermenting foods for safety, or infusing gin with quinine to prevent malaria. These acts of sensory adaptation were also acts of emotional continuity, attempts to recreate the taste of home under new skies. The resulting hybrids formed the foundations of modern global taste and cuisine.
