The History of Drugs In Society

Opium has been traded for a long time. It was part of a variety of goods that have been bought and sold for millenia. In this episode of the History of Drugs in Society, we start by exploring the early evolution of opium being traded, Marco Polo and the Silk Road, and European colonization in Asia through the 1600s. 

Feel free to reach out on Twitter (@DrugsHistory) or email ([email protected]).

The audio used for the intro comes from The Great Age of Exploration (1400-1550) Documentary from Discovery Education Documentary and The Distant Drummer: Flowers of Darkness as posted on C-SPAN. Credits on the music goes to Blue Dot Sessions. 

In this episode, I interview Prof. Carolina Acker. She is a historian, professor emerita at Carnegie Mellon's Dietrich College, and author of the book Creating the American junkie. We touch on topics ranging from the history of psychiatry to the laws that started drug prohibition to the changing nature of who was using opiates from the 1890s through the first half of the 20th century. We talk a lot about the context around drug usage and the study of addiction, though a few questions are directly related to opium and its usage. 

You can learn more about:

Feel free to reach out on Twitter (@DrugsHistory) or over email ([email protected]). 

This episode will review the impacts of the coronavirus on both illegal and legal drug markets. In terms of illegal markets, this includes how drug trafficking organizations and street-level drug markets have been affected. As far as legal markets go, we'll take a look at how harm reduction and medical support services and opioid prescriptions overall are dealing with the pandemic, and an example of disinformation. 

You can find the full transcript with citations here. 

Audio used for the intro:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_sS28TZL90

Feel free to reach out on Twitter (@DrugsHistory) and email ([email protected])

In the first full episode of the History of Drugs in Society, we explore opium as medicine. This will take us from its origins thousands of years ago until the early 1800s. One of the main points of this episode is to see when opioid usage started in the doctor's office. 

Intro clip takes audio from Dr. Lydia Kang's talk entitled Origin of Opium and Heroin Treatment from C-SPAN on 12/11/2017. 

Some main sources used include: 

• Opium by John Halpern and David Blistein

You can find a full list of sources here. 

In this episode, I go over why I am doing this, what you can expect from the podcast, some context on where this journey ends, and some terms. All of this is meant to provide some additional context but isn't necessary to follow the podcast. Feel free to reach out over email [email protected]

Credit to Blue Dot Sessions for the music. You can find the audio used for in the intro on C-SPAN.

For a full list of citations, you can go here. 

This is a brief introduction to the History of Drugs in Society podcast, which is launching on April 7th. This podcast explores the history of different substances and how we’ve lived alongside and interacted with them. 

I hope you'll join along for the journey. Feel free to reach out at [email protected].