Sugar In Sweetness And Power

Throughout Sweetness and Power, Sidney Mintz “[stresses] sugar’s usefulness as a mark of rank — to validate one’s social position, to elevate others, or to define them as inferior” (139). From a luxury of the authority to a commodity that is a source of power, sugar has an extensive history as a product that has had a deep impact on the diets of the English. In the eleventh century, only a small number of people knew about sugar, however, once sugar became known, it worked its way into becoming a necessity in the daily diets of the people. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, sugar is primarily exclusive to the wealthy in England as it is deemed a luxury that few could afford. The production and consumption of sugar eventually increases. In

This is especially prominent before the eighteenth century as “sugar was really the monopoly of a privileged minority” (45), a monopoly of those in the position of authority and wealth. The commoners could not even dream of purchasing sugar as the wealthy did — It was either one could afford sugar or they could not. There is definitive line between who the consumers of the sugar enterprise are at this time. The use of sugar as a decoration exemplifies this. During the sixteenth century, elaborate displays of sugar are produced, “but the preciousness of the ingredients, and the large quantities required, confined such practices at first to the king, the nobility, the knighthood, and the church” (89). It is not a practice that the lower classes could not afford to do. Not to mention the fact that the displays of such valuable substances brought pleasure to the authority as it validated their positions. The displays “embodied . . . the host’s wealth power and status . . . By eating these strange symbols of his power, his guests validated that power” (90). In this case, power refers to more of authority rather than actual power, as the act of eating the sugar decorations validates that the host is in a position of authority in which they are able to afford such large quantities of sugar. The guests

During this time period, sugar becomes cheaper and larger quantities of it are produced to accommodate the growing demand for it. Whereas sugar acts as a luxury symbol of authority before the Industrial revolution, in the eighteenth century it becomes more of everyday item that the general public can use. With a larger number of people consuming sugar, it was no longer an item that was exclusive to the wealthy, thus “its potency as a symbol of power declined while its potency as a source of profit gradually increased” (95). This is a process of extensification as Mintz describes it: “a recasting of the meanings, now detached from the past, and from those given by other social groups” (122). In contrast, intensification mimics consumption by those with a high status. These meanings of sugar are significant as “those who controlled society held a commanding position not only in regard to the availability of sugar, but the also in regard to at least some of the meanings that sugar products [acquire]” (152). As the meaning attached to sugar changes completely, many people saw that “producing, shipping, refining, and taxing sugar [are becoming] proportionately more effective sources of power for the powerful, since the sums of money involved [are] so much larger”