Final Feast and Course Awards

Carrying on the tradition established by last year’s cohort, Deep History and Domestication finished the semester with domesticate inspired food and course awards.  We had quite a feast!  From silk-inspired gummy worms, to “dog biscuits,” goat-cheese dip, chocolate (cow’s) milk, “pigs” in a blanket, yeasty bread, and (back for lack of a better idea) domesticate cookies, we noshed our way through the animal imaginary that shaped the course this semester.  We declared Corinne’s human-dog biscuits a success, lauded Kelly’s and Corinne’s culinary explorations, admired Peter’s resourcefulness, savored Cara’s goat cheese dip, and polished off Tanner’s chocolate milk and french fries (provided as “food that is eaten with hamburgers but not offensive to vegetarians ;-)). And we all agreed that Molly’s cupcake tableau of animal cracker camels traversing a desert was amazing!

2014DHDomLastDayThe research projects are complete and posted, and anyone who visits this site should check them out!  They share a common structure, but are unique and inspiring in their design and execution. We gave out several course awards, including, Best Overall Project, for Camel, The Most Undervalued and Invaluable Creature (which also won the Best Design category), and “Cutest Pictures” which had strong finalists in Dogs and Their People, Domesticating Wilbur, and Goats. There was firm consensus that the winner in the “Best Title” category was “A Fungus Amongus” (although I must point out that yeast might be a domesticate but is not an animal).  Tanner’s chocolate milk reminded us of the importance of lactase persistance in the evolution of human society, just as his project on cattle emphasizes how reciprocal the domestication process is.  Peter kept us on our toes all semester (synthetic meat, anyone?), and offers some intriguing insights about the influence of silk on human history and happiness.

Thanks so much for a wonderful semester!  I learned a lot and enjoyed our explorations of domestication tremendously.

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