Tesco
Oceans of Grain
Book

Oceans of Grain

How American Wheat Remade the World

Scott Reynolds Nelson
Basic Books, 2022

Read or listen offline

  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×

Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Eye Opening
  • Background
  • Engaging

Recommendation

Professor Scott Reynolds Nelson takes an evocative look at political economics, largely through the lens of grain trading. This focus on seemingly simple commodities highlights how economics – in its most fundamental form, the trading of goods – shapes the complexity of human history. Nelson deftly shows that economic practicalities like food shortages, national interests and competition lay at the root of battles, wars and revolutions, particularly in 19th-century Russia, America and Ukraine, with impacts that resonate to this day. 

Take-Aways

  • The story of grain is older than recorded history.
  • The region consisting of southwestern Russia and Ukraine has for centuries been ideal for wheat cultivation.
  • The debate over human enslavement in the grain-growing Midwest states helped trigger the US Civil War.

About the Author

Scott Reynolds Nelson is a professor of humanities at the University of Georgia. He is a Guggenheim fellow and the author of five books, including the award-winning Steel Drivin’ Man.

Comment on this summary or 开始讨论