As the made-up bête noire of the United States government since the folks in charge of the nation’s ill-thought and largely ineffective alcohol prohibition law entered into its death throes in the early 1930s and finally breathed its last thanks to the passage in 1933 of the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution discovered that they would be out of jobs unless they could redirect the juggernaut they had created to fight “the demon rum,” plants of the Genus Cannabis have been the focus of equally ill-thought federal programs of prohibition.
Dubbed “marijuana” as part of the media blitz undertaken by Harry Anslinger of the U.S. Treasury Department that drew heavily upon racism and xenophobia to create the incorrect impression that innocent (white) Americans were being lured into getting high and subsequently throwing themselves out of windows by “pushers” and “dope fiends,” the wasteful madness continued well into the following century. Finally, in 2012, the states of Washington and Colorado legalized Cannabis for recreational use by adults, opening the door for dozens more states to do likewise. However for those like Prof. Bradley J. Borougerdi who know the much deeper history of the plant and its use by humans, the past century of foolishness surrounding it is but small fraction of its fascinating full and multi-faceted story.
In his recently published book Cannabis; A Global History, Prof. Borougerdi presents his readers with the remarkable, complex, millennia-spanning history of how humans discovered, investigated, cultivated, employed, cherished, and even worshiped with species of Cannabis plants. Far from being ignited and inhaled, he explains how parts of the C. indica and C. sativa plants have more commonly been consumed, drunk, and applied as topical ointments for reasons that have more often been culinary, medicinal, and spiritual than recreational. Thus it is indeed quite appropriate, and not just a bit deliciously ironic, that this very informative book is included in the publisher’s Edible series in which each volume explores particular items or categories of food and drink.
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