MIT Seminar on Environmental and
Agricultural History
“The Triumph of Wheat: Defining Agriculture in the Development Decade”
Nick Cullather
Associate Professor of History, Indiana University
Before dwarf wheat became the emblem of a “green revolution,” a
different plant, jute, symbolized the future of rural India. Jute was
the miracle crop of the 1950s. It catalyzed new industries, fuelled a
dynamic village handicrafts sector, and amassed the bulk of India’s
export earnings. Modern peasants grew jute. But modernity has an
unsteady meaning when it comes to agriculture, and wheat’s victory
over jute reveals just how radically the ambitions of development
policy could shift, and how cold war rivalries influenced what Indians
grew and ate.
Friday, October 24, 2008
2:30 to 4:30 pm
Building E51 Room 095
Corner of Wadsworth and Amherst Streets, Cambridge
Sponsored by MIT’s History Faculty and the Program in Science,
Technology, and Society. For more information or to be put on the
mailing list, please contact Margo Collett at [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________
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