An ‘Opium Zone’ From Assam to Yunnan: Opium Trade, Imperial Interests and Politics of Control in a Frontier Landscape

A careful examination of the epigraphic and literary sources, including accounts left by early European travellers to Assam like Tavernier, Bernier, Manucci and Glanius, speak of Assam as a very fertile country with trading links across Burma into China. Marketable commodities were exported not only to the neighbouring provinces but also to adjacent countries; Burma, Tibet, China- by the mountain passes, land and water routes. Indeed, it was the lucrative trade with Tibet and China passing through Assam that was a vital factor in efforts of the Turko-Afghan kings and the Tai-Shans to capture the Brahmaputra valley.

Colonial reports foreshadow the growing importance of the region as central to the Imperial strategy of opening up communications. Cold statistics and correspondence from the personal papers of leading British firms of the time, Jardine Matheson and Baring Brothers, and debates in the British press and parliament reveal how the issue of opening up of trade with China was intensely pursued. Following the opium imbroglio culminating in the Opium Wars, the colonial power was on the lookout for new routes. The opium trade had grown fundamental to Britain’s economic framework to be ignored/abandoned. So, how did Assam fit into the power play of the politics of trade and expansion? In opium, they found a plausible approach. Opium was all over the frontier. Despite the growth of local poppies in Yunnan, the ‘Chinamen’ exhibited preference for the Patna opium for smoking. The ‘Assam’ opium was also much in demand in Yunnan. Opium became a valuable article for exchange and was found to be traded for gold across the frontier.

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Addiction Lives Interview: Paul Roman

This post provides some excerpts from an “Addiction Lives” interview with Paul Roman, a researcher in the alcohol and addictions field for 55 years, who talks about the early years of the NIAAA. You can read the full interview here.

The “Addiction Lives” interview project is a print and online collaboration between the Society for the Study of Addiction and the journal Addiction. The series explores the views and personal experiences of people who have contributed to the evolution of ideas in the Addiction journal’s field of interest.

“Addiction Lives” is edited by Professor Virginia Berridge and this interview was conducted by Points co-founder Trysh Travis in August 2021.


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Cannabis Consumption in India: A History

Editor’s Note: In her latest post for Points Kawal Deep Kour resurrects a past editorial feature: ‘Cannabis: Global Histories‘. She contributes to this rich history by outlining the multitudinous roles and affordances of cannabis within Indian cultures.


Much before the Irish physician Sir William Brooke O Shaughnessy (1808-1889) introduced cannabis into Western medicine sometime around the mid-nineteenth century, Ganja (hemp) had already been part of India’s living culture as medicine and an intoxicating agent – even before 1000 B.C. The use of hemp in India was also mentioned by Jewish physician Garcia de Orta in 1563 and subsequently by the Dutch administrator in India, Hendrik van Rheede ( 1636-1691) who in his treatise, Hortus Malabaricus (the garden of Malabar) described that ganja smoking was popular on the Malabar coast. Ganja is an intoxicating drug, derived from the leaves of the Cannabis Indica plant. The philosophy of cannabis consumption in India entails the sacred lore of having emerged in the form of a pot of nectar while the gods and the demons were churning the ocean with the help of mountain Mandara and Vasuki, the serpent king. It was named Vijaya and was believed to bestow victory upon its votaries. It is said that the Gods then wished that it be sent to live with humans on Earth and aid in their merriment and enjoyment of the pleasures of life. 

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A Tale of Two Clauses: Due Process in Racialized Reproductive Freedom

For Women’s History Month, I’m so pleased to celebrate three women who have each, through their original work, taught me important lessons about the history of drug control. This second post in my series on Drugs, Women, and Families summarizes an exceptional research paper written by Lydia Wendel during my seminar in drug law last year. She identified two very different constitutional and legislative histories that defined reproductive freedom: one path for white women and another path for all other, or BIPOC, women. The U.S. Constitution’s “due process of law” clause appears twice, commanding both federal and state governments to provide it to all citizens. Wendel’s remarkable insight into how these words have worked to protect the rights of some women while forsaking others gave me a deeper understanding of this difficult and vital aspect of constitutional law. She arrives at a chilling conclusion: that these two constitutional paths are now converging to the detriment of overall reproductive freedom for all women in the United States.

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SALIS Digital Library—Indispensable Drug & Alcohol History Resource

Salis Collection
SALIS Collection home page.

Editor’s Note: Today’s post comes from Points Editor Emeritus Ron Roizen.

Dear POINTS readers, 

If you haven’t yet made use of the SALIS Collection of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drugs digital library, then you may have a real treat in store. Curated and maintained by the Substance Abuse Librarians and Information Specialists (SALIS) and hosted on the Internet Archive, the SALIS Collection:

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Quiet Radicals: The Life and Work of Ruth and Edward Brecher

Brechers Title Card
Image of Ruth (Cook) Brecher from the Philadelphia Inquirer, April 9, 1933; Image of Edward Brecher from the Minneapolis Star Tribune, June 6, 1932.

Part 1 – Ruth Came First

Editor’s Note: This post is by Points Managing Editor Emerita Emily Dufton. She holds a PhD in American Studies from George Washington University and is the author of Grass Roots: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Marijuana in America. Email Emily at emily.dufton@gmail.com and follow her on Twitter @emily_dufton. Welcome back, Emily!

There’s something about the topic of drugs that can invite great writer couples to tackle the subject together. Going back nearly a century, spouses Dr. Charles E. Terry and Mildred Pellens co-authored their 1,042-page opus The Opium Problem in 1928. In 1996’s Smoke and Mirrors: The War on Drugs and the Politics of Failure, Dan Baum (who passed away from brain cancer last year) dedicated the book to his wife Margaret, who was his “reporting and writing partner” and “a genius at wrangling meaning from a sentence.” “My name is on the cover,” Baum acknowledged, “but the book is equally Margaret’s.”

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CFP ADHS 2022—”Rethinking Alcohol and Drugs: Global Transformations / Local Practices in History”

The Alcohol and Drugs History Society is pleased to release its call for papers for the 2022 biennial ADHS conference, currently scheduled for June 15–17 in Mexico City. The 2022 conference theme will be “Rethinking Alcohol and Drugs: Global Transformations / Local Practices in History.”

The conference will be a collaboration between the ADHS and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México-Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales (IIS-UNAM). ADHS hopes that this conference will be an in-person event, but please stayed tuned for more details in early 2022.

Descubrimiento del pulque
José María Obregón, El descubrimiento del pulque, 1869. Image courtesy of Wikimedia.

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