The History of Chocolate

Students survey the 4000-year-old history of chocolate: from its ancient Mesoamerican origins as a bitter drink of ritual and medicine, to the growth of a modern “chocolate culture” and its place as a mass-produced globalized product of the twentieth century. Students investigate how chocolate came to be imported into Europe by the Spanish during the sixteenth century and transformed into a sugary drink of the nobility, as well as its later importance to colonization, the slave trade and the Industrial Revolution. Students explore, through six module videos with integrated reading assignments, podcasts and other media, current academic research on the topic and encounter a wide range of primary sources including art, literature and the economic and administrative documents of daily life. Students also have the opportunity to analyze several primary sources (historical documents, paintings, photographs and maps) relevant to the study of chocolate’s cultural history.