Eating Guinea Pigs in Illinois Bryan Clemons 2011
Goals Experience Cuy Husbandry Adapt this Subsistence Strategy to fit the North American Domicile Put Guinea Pigs on the Table in Edwardsville IL
Methods Experiential Field notes Video, Pictures Hermeneutic Reflection (Hodder 1991) Autoethnography (Wall 2006) Rich in personal inferences My understandings
Archaeological Record Exploitation of cuy s wild ancestor 9000 years ago (wing 1986) Central Andean highlands middens Charred remains, with cut Marks Fully domesticated 4500 years ago (Wing 1997) Sacrificial offerings Kotosh Chavin de Huantar Domesticated 5000-7000 years ago? (Stahl 2003)
Domestication Wild ancestor: (Cavia aperea) Anatomical Studies (Stahnke & Hendrichs 1988) Molecular Analysis (Spotorno et al. 2006) Artificial Selection Morphological Neoteny Behavioral Reduction of aggressiveness Less attentive Increased reproduction Breed in captivity
How Did They Get Here? A long trip twice across the Atlantic Three Step Hypothesis 1- Andes :original domestication 2- Europeans: took a few home with them in the 1600 s 3- Creole: meat production 2 lineages of (Cavia porcellus) DNA (Spotorno et al.)
Ethnographic Studies Andean Peoples Traditionally Hearth is home Diet: scraps, and hay Water Modern Farms Cuyrias
My Kitchen Floor! Natural Habitat?
Adaptation North American Domicile Basement
Sustainability Compostables Not going to a landfill Protein Source Not much on the bone Low resource cost
Taboo? Pet-Keeping Human Phenomena From: suburbia North America To: jungle dwelling tribes Kalapalo tribe of Amazonia (Serpell 1989)?Not So Much?
Food and Identity Poor Peoples Food In The Andes Cuy North America Squirrel, Raccoon $$ eating poor can be expensive $$
Ethical Issues Cuy Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) Care People CITI (working with guinea pigs in a research setting) Diet: whole foods, no pellets Housing Honesty Provide finished product
My First Bite Of Cuy
Cuy de Cuba
Cuy Conclusion Raising them is easy Low energy input, but low return Environmentally Friendly For most North Americans it s odd to eat guinea pigs Taboo? Less than anticipated
Acknowledgements Bryon Daggett- chef extraordinaire Talbert Eisenberg my mentor and friend Russell Sanders- for great advice Greg Vogel- you ve been GREAT! Julie Holt- you inspire me Cleo s- family restaurant bar and grill Shannon- for all the pens Jojo- for everything
Bibliography Bolton, Ralph 1979 Guinea Pigs, Protein, and Ritual. Ethnology 18 (3): 229-252. Gade W. Daniel 1967 The Guinea Pig in Andean Folk Culture. Geographical Review 57 (3): 213-224. DeFrance, D. Susan 2006 The Sixth toe: The Modern Culinary Role of the Guinea Pig in Southern Peru. Food & Foodways 14:3 34. Diamond, Jared 1999 Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of human Societies. W.W. Norton & Company, New York, NY. pp 100 Erikson, Phillipe 2000 The social significance of pet-keeping among Amazonia Indians. In Companion animals and us : exploring the relationships between people and pets. edited by Anthony L. Podberscek, Elizabeth S. Paul, James A. Serpell. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. Hodder, Ian 1991 Interpretive Archaeology and Its Role. American Antiquity 56 (1):7-18 Kunzi Christine, and Norbert Sachser 1998 The behavioral endocrinology of domestication: a comparison between the domestic guinea pig (Cavia aperea f. porcellus) and its wild ancestor, the cavy ( Cavia aperea). Hormones and Behavior 35:28-37.
Bibliography Lantz E. David 1917 Raising Guinea Pigs. Government Printing Office. Washington, DC. Mintz W. Sidney, and Christine M. Du Bois 2002 The Anthropology of Food and Eating. Annual Review of Anthropology 31: 99-119. Sandweiss H. Daniel and Elizabeth S. Wing 1997 Ritual Rodents: The Guinea Pigs of Chincha, Peru. Journal of Field Archaeology 24 (1): 47-58 Serpell James 1989 Pet-keeping and Animal Domestication: a Reappraisal. In The Walking Larder: Patterns of Domestication, Pastoralism, and Predation. edited by Juliet Clutton-Brock. Unwin Hyman Ltd, London, UK. Sidky H. 2004. Postmodern Anthropology and cultural Construction. Perspectives on Culture. edited by Sidky. New Jersey: Pearson Education. pp. 394-412. Shanklin, Eugenia 1985 Sustenance and Symbol: Anthropological Studies of Domesticated Animals. Annual Review of Anthropology 14 pp. 375-403. Shell, Marc 1986 The family Pet. Representations. 15: 121-153. Stahl W. Peter 2003 Pre-Columbian Andean Animal Domesticates at the Edge of Empire. World Archaeology 34 (3) : 470-483 Spotorno E. A., et al. 2006 Ancient and modern steps during the domestication of guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus L.). Journal of Zoology 270: 57-62. Wall, Sarah. 2006. An Autoethnography on Learning about Autoethnography. International Journal of Qualitative Methods 5(2):1-12.