Scent and Society
Cultural Series
2018 – ongoing
Scent and Society explores the multiplicity of perfume history – unlearning the Eurocentric narrative of perfumery by presenting research and practices from around the world. An ongoing program at the Institute for Art and Olfaction, Scent and Society has taken (and will continue to take) various forms.
The program was launched in 2018 with an exploration of scent practices across the Middle East and North Africa curated by Dana El Masri. Scent and Society returned in 2020 through the end of 2023 in the form of a series of talks curated by Nuri McBride.
Scent and Society is currently on hiatus, and will return soon.
PAST PROGRAMS
2020-2023 Program
Curated by Nuri McBride
in 2020 – 2023, Scent and Society was curated by writer, perfumer, researcher, and community organiser, Nuri McBride. The program took the form of a semi-monthly series of talks that highlighted the various historical threads relating to perfumery and scent-making across time, and across the world – from the practices of ancient people to today’s independent perspectives.
About the curator
Nuri McBride is a writer, perfumer, researcher, and community organiser based in Haifa, Israel. Nuri has been honoured to serve as the Program Curator for the Scent & Society lecture series since 2020. She is the co-editor of Alabastron, a community-centred publication focused on inclusive and accessible learning environments for aromatic history, culture, and practice. She explores the intersection of olfaction and death rituals with The Death/Scent Project and examines fragrance history with the Aromatica de Profundis newsletter. She is also the proprietor of ATROPOS Parfums & Consultancy, where she creates bespoke fragrances and consults with other brands on historical preparations. She is planning the launch of a ready-to-wear line in the near future. Learn More: nurimcbride.com
–
2023 Series
Curated by Nuri McBride
November 5 – Oud: An Aromatic Cultural History, with Nuri McBride
In this talk, we examine oud not merely as a beloved fragrance but as an aromatic artefact existing within overlapping cultural sensoria. We will look at oud from a Sensory Anthropological and linguistic perspective, focusing on the social impact of olfaction in three sensory-linguistical case studies.
–
October 22 – The Sensuality of the Séance, with Dr. Kate Cherrell
Far from being a simple belief system, modern spiritualism transformed the way in which many people interacted with the world, with much of that transformation taking place through the process of séance. In the home and in small, rented rooms, mediums and believers alike could transcend social, cultural and gender norms; allowing women bodily autonomy, empowering the working classes and inciting the dead to walk amongst us. Séance is an immersive and addictive experience, where domestic spaces are transformed into liminal spheres, where each sense brings about a fresh and vulnerable experience. With the touch of a spirit’s robe, the soft hand of a stranger, the smell of heavenly bouquets, the glimpse of a manifesting spirit or the sound of hymns, sung into darkness; all culminates in the heightened, unseen and unspoken power of the séance room.
–
October 10 – The Scent of Grief: A Brief Survey of Aromatic Death Rituals, with Nuri McBride
Scent connects us to memory in an extraordinary way. It connects us to how an odour made us feel in the past, and more so, it makes us feel those emotions again. One whiff of grandma’s perfume doesn’t just help us remember her; we relive the experience of being in her presence. It is almost like she is with us again for a brief moment. Likewise, the day a loved one’s smell leaves their favourite sweater can be heartbreaking. The last remains of their living essence in your life is gone. You will never smell that smell again, which can induce an unfathomable sense of loss. For these reasons, scent has played a prominent, but mostly silent, role in the mourning rituals of many cultures worldwide.
–
The Aesthetic and Political Potential of People’s Scents, with Lauryn Mannigel
In this lecture, Lauryn Mannigel will discuss how her work on the aesthetic and political potential of people’s scents diversifies how we think about, embody and express our experience of people’s scents. By demonstrating the crucial role our olfactory perception plays in our social experiences, she will critically examine it in relation to othering in society and science. Finally, Lauryn will focus on how her work can promote social change.
–
September 10 – Smells Like Xenophobia, with Nuri McBride
For centuries people have used the language of olfaction to express their disgust and horror at the Other. Who the Other has always been flexible, but the allusion to olfactive disgust remains eerily consistent in hate rhetoric to this day. In this class, we will briefly explore olfactory imagery in the rhetoric of prejudice, focusing on major reoccurring themes. We will examine scent as a tool for creating ‘in-group’ space and otherness and discuss the science and growing philosophical discourse around why people blindly hate and the part olfaction may play
–
August 13 – Perfumed Papers: The Evolution of the Perfume Formula, with Nuri McBride
The Formula! It is the most coveted and protected object in the fragrance trade. The formula is more than just a recipe; it is a conduit of knowledge. In this class, we will explore how, historically, the fragrance trade, a famously secretive business, shared knowledge. We will explore how people shared trade knowledge before the concept of the formula. We will look at some of the oldest formulas found and what they say about the process of creating perfume at the time. We will examine how the printing press threatened the Early Modern guild system and discuss the changing contemporary views on formula transparency.
–
August 6 – The Sensorial Home & Garden: Exploring Historical Domestic Scents in Chile, with Amalia Castro and Catherine Burdick
Amalia Castro and Catherine Burdick explore the pleasurable scents of colonial-style homes in central Chile during the colonial and early Republican eras. The elite colonial homes of Spanish America were replete with a myriad of pleasant aromas, and those of central Chile were no exception. Situated in an agreeable Mediterranean climate, the delightful patio gardens and reception rooms of central Chilean homes contributed to the staging of idyllic settings where familial and social networks were maintained. Using historical archives, we begin by reconstructing the botanical contents of the patio gardens that bloomed within the enclosed spaces of the home. We then move to the aromas enjoyed in interior rooms, focusing on the semi-public reception rooms where extended families and their guests were entertained.
–
July 23 – The Colonial History of the Fragrance Trade, with Nuri McBride
As with culinary spices, the trade in aromatics is an ancient business and perhaps the first truly global trade. Humans have sailed into unknown waters, walked across deserts, and travelled across the steppes for thousands of miles on camelback in search of beautiful smells. The aromatic trade’s long history is often mythologised as an exciting adventure story of discovery and commerce. Yet, how can you discover something that has been known and used by another community for thousands of years? Some of that trade was equitable, bringing wealth and beautiful scents to both communities, but much of it was far from fair.
–
July 9 – How Aromatics from Across the Ocean Changed the Chinese Sensorium, with Linda Rui Feng
The uses of aromatics in China from the 3rd to 10th centuries CE were multi-faceted, and operated in medicinal, religious, as well as secular contexts. This talk explores some of its highlights during this period, through both archeological discoveries and through literature, to show how imported scents from Southeast Asia transformed this olfactory world.
–
June 26 – Redolent Garments: A Brief History of Perfumed Textiles, with Nuri McBride
To the modern mind, fragranced apparel seems a bit camp and reminds us of the strawberry-scented jelly shoes of the 1980s. Historically, however, from the masking of tannery odours to the perfuming of goldwork embroidery, fragrance added immense value and luxury to textiles. In this class, we will explore the development of perfumed textiles from around the world. We will examine the techniques used to scent fabrics, but more importantly, we will investigate the cultural significance behind these redolent garments.
–
May 29 – Precious Vessels: A Brief History of the Perfume Bottle, with Nuri McBride
For the vast majority of human history, perfume was a precious limited resource. Liquides of such rare beauty couldn’t be stored in any old jar…or could they? In this class, we will survey the history and evolution of fragrance containers from the ancient to the modern, the humble to the hyper-luxurious, and look at examples from around the world. By exploring these physical objects, we will examine how different societies used and valued perfume over time.
–
April 10 – Sniffing out the History of Modern Shanghai, with Xuelei Huang
How did past environments, objects, and people smell? What can aromas and stenches tell about history? This talk will offer an olfactory reading of Nanjing Road in Shanghai over the span of a century. Built in the mid-1840s by the earliest British colonizers shortly after the Opium War, Nanjing Road can be conceived as a slice of Chinese modernity. Senior Lecturer in Chinese Studies at the University of Edinburgh, Xuelei Huang will explore how the sense of smell engaged with the environmental, affective, and political histories of this archetypal high street in modern China.
–
April 3 – The Great Stink: How Smell Made the Modern City, with Nuri McBride
From the scent of cherry blossoms near the Washington Monument to the pong of urine behind your favourite bar, living in cities has always meant living with smells. Scent can be the most challenging of our senses in urban settings because we have little personal control over what we smell in the environment. Yet, the olfactory experiences of urban environments are not happenstance, they are as constructed as the architecture. However, we rarely consider how those olfactory choices get made or who makes them. In this class, we will explore several cases of urban odours that historically changed the way we live in and build cities. We will also look at contemporary cases that challenge how we use urban space and share our olfactive environment in the future.
–
March 27 – Scent and Silver: Fragrance and Personal Adornment in SWANA, with Sigrid van Roode
Fragrance in personal appearance is much more than just beautification. From fragrant jewellery to henna patterns, from spiritual meaning to the expression of social values, scent serves many purposes and permeates every aspect of life. Frankincense, musk, rosewater and oudh connect continents, millennia, families and objects – until the last whiff of fragrance disappears and leaves us with only the tangible remnants of their presence. This online talk shares research from jewellery historian and archaeologist Sigrid van Roode, focusing on scent and personal adornment in North Africa and Southwest Asia.
–
March 6 – Scent Culture Theory 202: Tools for Auto-Ethnography, with Nuri McBride
Scent Culture 202 will help give tools for applying those theories in real-world environments for data collection. We will explore how that data can be used and presented in both academic and artistic ways. These techniques are valuable skills for perfumers, scent artists, and academics, but most importantly, for those interested in exploring the world around them in new ways.
–
February 27 – A Wondrous Scent from the Parterre, with Nicolas Roth
By the 18th century, elaborate descriptions of gardens, both real and fictional, had become a common feature of literary works in several North Indian languages. Replete with botanical detail, these verbal celebrations of luxury and sophistication set out idealized scentscapes composed of culturally significant plants. This talk will discuss examples from several Urdu narrative poems, highlighting explicit and implicit references to fragrance and perfumery and a wealth of scented South Asian flora.
–
February 13 – Rose, An Aromatic Cultural History, with Nuri McBride
There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Allegorical, mythical, magical and on occasion-deadly, no other flower has captivated the human imagination quite like the rose. In this chapter of Aromatic Cultural History, we will briefly survey the 5,000-year account of the rose as a beloved cultivar, fragrance, flavouring, medicine and magical tool. Along the way, we will visit the rose in the Imperial Gardens of China. We will see her carried to freshly conquered lands by Mesopotamian armies. Rose will desperately try to cure plague victims in Europe and simultaneously become a symbol of eternal love.
–
January 23 – Sandalwood: From India to the Sudan, with Nehal El-Hadi
In this talk, Nehal El-Hadi will examine the historical, economic and political roles of Santalum album in the connections between Sudan and India, and the effects of global conservation efforts on an essential part of Sudanese scent culture.
–
January 16 – Scent Culture Theory 101: Scent Culture & Olfactory Heritage, with Nuri McBride
The history of perfume is, in some manner, that of civilisation. – Eugène Rimmel
Scent matters, not just as a commodity in perfume but as a cultural artefact. What odours we value as a society, which ones disgust us, and how we use them are all formed and informed by our scent culture. But what is a scent culture? How do we spot one when we smell it? What is the difference between culture and heritage?
–
2022 SERIES
Curated by Nuri McBride
December 5 – Myrrh, An Aromatic Cultural History, with Nuri McBride
“O Isis, giver of life, who dwells in the Pure Island, take to yourself the myrrh which comes from the Land of Punt…” -Hymn to Isis carved on the walls of her temple at Philae
The bitter tears of commiphora myrrha have fascinated and delighted humanity for aeons. These small lumps of gum resin may look unassuming but bear a profound cultural and religious significance spanning from Ancient Egypt to Modern China. We will follow this resin from its home range of East Africa, across communities and centuries to the state of myrrh today. In this class, Nuri McBride will survey the cultural history of myrrh as an aromatic, medicine, commodity, and ritual tool. We will examine myrrh’s importance in Near East religions, why it was worth its weight in gold, and what the future holds for myrrh in the face of over-harvesting and climate change.
–
November 7 – Tapputi-Beletekallim, The First Perfumer?, with Nuri McBride
Tapputi Beletekallim is the name of the first perfumer in the historical record. Her texts give us a glimpse into the earliest written history of perfume making and distillation. She was a woman important enough to have ancient scribes write down her name, which was no small feat. Yet, that name was lost to us until the 20th century, when a tablet was found that made the world re-examine everything it thought it knew about the roots of perfumery. In this class, we will explore the life of the first performer in the historical record. We will look at what we know of her work, position, and the society that fostered her. Along the way, we will examine how history is transmitted and ask who writes our stories and who gets to preserve them.
–
October 24 – Death by Perfume, with Dr. Christina Bradstreet
‘A fragrant breeze’ or preoccupation with scent wafted through British and European Symbolist art c.1890-1910. During this period, reverie images proliferated in which daydreaming female figures smell flowers, apply fragrance, make potpourri, perform magic, dance among incense fumes and repose by censers or swoon and suffocate amid intoxicating perfumes. This talk focuses on motifs of floral asphyxiation, perfume intoxication and drowning in scent in Symbolist paintings, prints and posters.
–
October 3 – The Scent of Grief: A Brief Survey of Aromatic Death Rituals, with Nuri McBride
Scent connects us to memory in a very special way. It connects us to how an odour made us feel in the past, and more so, it makes us feel those emotions again. One whiff of grandma’s perfume doesn’t just help us remember her, we relive the experience of being in her presence. It is almost like she is with us again for a brief moment. Likewise, the day a loved one’s smell leaves their favourite sweater can be heartbreaking. The last remains of their living essence in your life is gone. You will never smell that smell again and that can induce an unfathomable sense of loss. It is for these reasons that scent has played are prominent but mostly silent role in the mourning rituals of many cultures around the world.
–
September 19 – Covid & Smell: Behind the Glass Wall, with Dr. Danielle Reed
Five percent of people who lose their sense of smell during the acute phase of COVID have sustained loss and may never fully or even partially recover. For these people, they experience life from behind a glass wall, seeing but not smelling the world as it was before. Others who partially recover often have parosmia, which is an unpleasant distortion of the sense of smell. In this class, we will explore how millions of people worldwide are experiencing profound sensory changes, unlike anything that has happened before in human history.
–
August 22 – Indole: An Aromatic Cultural History, with Nuri McBride
Chemistry isn’t confined to a lab. Life is a chemical process, and chemistry significantly impacts our daily lives, but we rarely consider the social impact of those chemical reactions. You’ve probably never thought about an aromatic organic compound called indole before, but you’d know it if you smelt it. You smell it all the time, but it is more than just an odour. This microscopic compound is an olfactive harbinger of death, a siren of desire, a quintessential building block to happiness, and the secret ingredient for creating realistic floral perfumes. In this class, we will explore indole’s invisible but impactful role in our lives. We will examine how indole affects our bodies and sensory experiences. We will also apply an anthropological lens to explore how this compound influences society.
–
August 8 – Sensory Punishment: The Scents and Smells of Women’s Imprisonment, with Dorothy Abram
Professor Dorothy Abram explores the use of olfaction, both putrid and perfumed, for social control and for inmate resistance in the prison environment. Accompanying the development of women’s prisons in the United States in the 1800s, smells, scents, and perfumes were used to incorporate and embody dominant ideologies of gender and race in addition to providing the means to challenge social prejudices through olfaction.
–
June 27 – A Fragrant Bouquet of Art & History: A Conversation with Bharti Lalwani and Nuri McBride
Curator Nuri McBride joins us in conversation with art critic and independent perfumer Bharti Lalwani, discussing the development of the Bagh-e Hind exhibition opening at the Institute for Art and Olfaction on July 15th. This talk will go behind the scenes of the exhibition to discuss the olfactory landscape of Mughal-era South Asia and the art created in this cultural sensorium. This talk is presented as part of our ongoing Scent and Society series.
–
May 30 – The Great Stink: How Smell Shaped the Modern City, with Nuri McBride
From the scent of cherry blossoms near the Washington Monument to the pong of urine behind your favourite bar, living in cities has always meant living with smells. While all of our senses are employed as we explore our cities and towns, scent can be the most challenging in urban settings because there are lots of odours, but we have little personal control over what we smell. Yet, the olfactory experiences of urban environments are as constructed as the architecture. We rarely consider how those choices get made or who makes them. In this class, we will explore several cases of urban odours that historically changed the way we live in and build cities. We will also look at contemporary cases that challenge how we use urban space and share our olfactive environment in the future.
–
May 16 – Scent & Silver: Fragrance and personal adornment in Southwest Asia and North Africa, with Sigrid van Roode
Jewelry historian/archaeologist Sigrid van Roode discusses research into scent and personal adornment in North Africa and Southwest Asia. Fragrance in personal appearance is much more than just beautification. From fragrant jewellery to henna patterns, from spiritual meaning to the expression of social values, scent serves many purposes and permeates every aspect of life. Frankincense, musk, rosewater and oudh connect continents, millennia, families and objects – until the last whiff of fragrance disappears and leaves us with only the tangible remnants of their presence.
–
April 18 – The Black Death: From Plague Preservative to Perfume, with Nuri McBride
There is no history of humanity without a concurrent narrative of death and destruction. Indeed, the stories of survival from the Justinian Plague, the Black Death, and the Great Plagues of the 17th century are all testaments to humanity’s struggle with unprecedented and unexpected catastrophes. Yet, where there is great fear, there is also great inventiveness. Many resourceful would-be Medieval healers made heavy use of aromatics as plague preservatives, triggering a societal obsession with scent. Nuri McBride joins us for a historical look at how scent has played into perceptions of wellness, in this exploration of smell and public health.
–
March 28 – Scent Culture Theory 202: Tools for Aromatic Auto-Ethnography, with Nuri McBride
How does your nose help you collect data about your world? How do you record those sensations? What’s the value in recording such personal and ephemeral data? We will explore these questions in Scent Culture 202: Tools for Aromatic Auto-Ethnography. While it is recommended that students take both the 101 and 202 classes, the 101 class is not required to attend 202.
–
March 21 – Frankincense at the Crossroads, with Dr. Anjanette DeCarlo
Dr. Anjanette DeCarlo will look at factors impacting boswellia trees and their conservation status, as a United Nations CITES process, reviewing the genus is currently underway. She will also review changes over time as demand has increased sharply in the last decade. Lastly, she will explore both traditional uses and current uses of frankincense for its therapeutic action.
–
February 28 – The Colonial History of the Fragrance Trade, with Nuri McBride
The trade in aromatics, as with culinary spices, is an ancient business, and perhaps the first truly global trade. Humans have sailed into unknown waters, walked across deserts, and travelled across the steppes for thousands of miles on camelback in search of beautiful smells. The aromatic trade’s long history is often mythologised as an exciting adventure story of discovery and commerce. Yet, how can you discover something that has been known and used by another community for thousands of years? Academic Nuri McBride explores colonial history and trade in the context of perfumery.
–
February 21 – ‘Intimate Sense Labor’: Smell, Intimacy and Domestic Work, with Dr. Ishita Dey
In this talk, Dr. Ishita Dey focuses on the erasure of smells – an act that is central to the everyday lives of domestic workers across Indian cities. Sensory scholarship on domestic spheres has hinted at how do discourses on public health and hygiene inform the separation of spaces within our homes. There is also an emerging scholarship to understand work processes and smell such as masonry, woodworking, leatherwork in India but there is hardly any work devoted to reframing domestic work through the analytic of the senses.
This event is part of our ‘Scent and Society’ series, an ongoing exploration of the multiplicity of perfume histories across time, and across the world.
–
January, 2022 – Scent Culture Theory 101, with Nuri McBride
Scent matters, not just as a commodity in perfume but as a cultural artefact. What smells we value as a society, which ones disgust, and how they’re used, are both formed and informed by our scent cultures. But what is a scent culture? How do we spot one when we smell it? Throughout the Institute of Art and Olfaction’s lecture series, Scent & Society, we will be examining how aromatics impact society as a whole and people within it. This will take us from historical hygiene practices, global trade, to religious beliefs, and beyond. To help you gain the most from these talks Series Curator, Nuri McBride, has created this primer to help you understand the theory behind scent history and sociological fragrance education.
–
2021 Series
Curated by Nuri McBride
November – “Divine Disinfectant”: Scent, Religion & Racism in Rio de Janeiro, with Laurie Denyer
Aromatic chemical waste is made and discarded in the western subúrbios of Rio de Janeiro. It leaves the factory in a borrowed truck while a guard looks away. It is carefully crafted into a divine disinfectant in a piecemeal workshop next to a kitchen, then bottled in purchased trash from a trusted waste picker. Legs and a cart distribute it across a few communities, all with their own distinct forms of governance, and sell it on to local Pentecostal home businesses. Sometime thereafter, Pentecostals who frequent those businesses take a bottle from the shelf. They use it lovingly in their home, cultivating a space of worth and security in a part of the city historically and currently constructed by systems of anti-Black practice. On the one hand, this story seems to be about a liquid fragrance as a potentially toxic object circulating within a precarious neoliberal landscape. Told another way, however, it is a divine gift from God, doing divine work in the city. Can it possibly be both?
–
October – Fragrant Altars: Offerings to Our Beloved Dead, with Mauricio Garcia
The indolic scent of cempasuchil, the flower of a thousand petals as golden as the sun, rides the copal smoke rising from its *sahumador*, joining the scents of cacaloxochitl (red frangipani), cacao, molé, pulque, sugar skulls and almond candies in their song calling the spirits of the dead home for a short window of time. What began as an ancient indigenous veneration of Mictecacihuatl, the Goddess of Death, Dia de los Muertos is now a celebration that spans the whole of Mexico, crossing contemporary borders and boundaries between generations. During this talk, we will discuss the history and construction of the Dia de los Muertos altar, along with the role scented offerings play in this ancient Mexican tradition. We will explore important botanical species and sacred foods, as well as the importance of the “non-scented” components of an ancestral altar.
–
October 11 – The Scent of Grief: A Brief Survey of Aromatic Death Rituals, with Nuri McBride
Scent connects us to memory in a very special way. Its connects us to how an odour made us feel in the past, and more so, it makes us feel those emotions again. One whiff of grandma’s perfume doesn’t just help us remember her, we relive the experience of being in her presence. It is almost like she is with us again for a brief moment. Likewise the day a loved one’s smell leaves their favourite sweater can be heartbreaking. The last remains of their living essence in your life is gone. You will never smell that smell again and that can induce an unfathomable sense of loss. Nuri McBride explores how scent relates to grief rituals, in the latest of her Scent and Society lectures.
–
September – Aromatic Past, Acrid Futures? Trajectories of Human Olfactory Heritage, with Dr. Rose Boswell
Sensory studies call for a democracy of the senses in the advancement of more inclusive and equitable societies. In a sensory expressive and rich world, olfaction has obtained much public and social attention but was not deeply analysed in the social sciences until quite recently. In the last few years, the Covid-19 pandemic is again revealing the significance of olfaction to human cultural heritage and experience. Olfaction is being further affected by the anthropogenic impacts of the ‘modern’ age, apparent for example in climate change effects such as droughts and wildfires. In this class, we will consider the delicate interplay of aroma and smell, heritage and modernity, and of the past and present. We will examine this interplay through two examples, the US and the southwest Indian Ocean islands to illustrate complex human interactions with olfaction.
–
September 20, – Dangerous Women? Beauty, Perfume, and Poison, with Nuri McBride
Catherine de Medici, Lucrezia Borgia, Locasta, Agrippina, Madame de Brinvilliers, Catherine Monvoisin, Tofana. There is an old saying that poison is a woman’s weapon, but is that true? Did Agrippina kill the emperor with poisoned figs? Did Tofana, the perfumer turned wife-avenging poisoner, even exist? Are these the accounts of real Femme Fatales or the fever dreams of a patriarchal society? Nuri explores the social and cultural history of dangerous women, in the latest of her Scent and Society lectures.
–
August – A Brief Cultural History of Aromatics in Medieval China, with Linda Rui Feng
The uses of aromatics in medieval China (approximately 3rd-11th centuries CE) were multi-faceted, and operated in medicinal, religious, as well as secular contexts. This talk surveys some of its highlights through literature and archeological discoveries. In this talk, Linda Rui Feng, will review sense perception and the olfactory landscape of medieval China, leading to a greater understanding of the role of aromatics in medicinal practice, religious rituals, and everyday life in the medieval era. She will also review contemporary literature to understand olfactory beliefs and practices, and examine archeological objects that inform what we know about aromatic use.
–
August 23 – The Putrid and the Divine: The Scent of Saints, with Nuri McBride
There is a long tradition within Christianity, particularly in the early church, of framing miraculous events in a sensorial, even a sensual, way. Early Christian writers grounded these visitations in the senses so that magic seemed touchable, holiness could be tasted, and the divine had a smell. This created a lush, dramatic, and delightfully odd world of reeking Pillar Saints, rose-scented stigmata wounds, and visitations by sentient smell clouds. Not everyone was a fan of this sensory approach, and it’s fallen out of fashion in theological circles, but its influence can still be felt across the spectrum of Christian belief.
–
July 26 – The Babylonian Roots to Early Middle Eastern Perfumery, with Nuri McBride
For centuries European Academia thought that once the knowledge to read cuneiform was lost, the technological advancements of Ancient Mesopotamia became utterly inaccessible. At the same time, the astronomic rise of chemical and alchemical education in the Arabic speaking work shortly after the rise of Islam was viewed as an anomaly. We will challenge these notions in this class and instead examine how specialised trades like perfumery preserved skills and techniques from antiquity into the Middle Ages. That collective trade knowledge served as the bedrock from which the great scholars of the Islamic Golden Age developed and explained the understanding of chemistry, which impacts us even today.
–
July 12 – The Scent of Gan Eden: Olfaction in Judaism, with Nuri McBride
Scent plays an important role in most religions. Odour can reinforce our connection to a place and community. It can connect us to emotions and nostalgia, be used as a sacrifice and help create an environment of sacredness. While Judaism may not be the first religion most people think of when they think of religious scents, Judaism does, in fact, have a long history of religious aromatics. In this class, Nuri McBride will explore the Jewish spiritual understanding of breath, life, and scent. We will explore how scent was used both metaphorically and ritualistically in the Temple and post Temple periods, as well as ways in which aromatics are used today in contemporary Jewish communities all over the world.
–
June 2021 – Perfume for the Caliphs: Perfumery in Early Islamic Times, with Dr. Anya King
Perfumery in early Islamic times was a many-sided phenomenon. Both men and women used numerous varieties of compounds that emphasized good scent. While including familiar incenses, waters, and oils, these often overlapped with cosmetics and personal care products. In addition, perfumes were appreciated for visual as well as olfactory qualities, and in literature an elaborate connoisseurship of aromatics and perfumes may be seen. Their role in Islamic civilization is also evident from the artistic skill lavished on the paraphernalia of perfumery, such as bottles and censers. Many of the forms of perfumes were comparable to the perfumes of the ancient Near Eastern peoples, but the advent of distillation enabled the widespread use of scented waters, especially rosewater. The ingredients of perfumery in Islamic times, however, show significant differences because of the advent of previously unfamiliar or uncommon aromatics such as aloeswood, ambergris, cloves, jasmine, and musk. Perfume was also a notable component of the medical arts, and we will explore this topic based on the literature left by physicians who left extensive writings on the subject.
–
May 17 – Tapputi Badakallim, The First Perfumer, with Nuri McBride
Tapputi Badakallim, Tapputi Mistress of the Palace, was a woman of such power and acclaim that her reputation as a chemist and perfumer lived on for 1,000 years after her death. Yet, her name was lost to time until the 1860s when a tablet was translated and the world had to reexamine what it thought it knew about when and where certain knowledge began. In this class, we will explore the life of the first performer in the historic record. We will look at what we know of her work and position, the society that fostered her and the school of chemistry that she was a part of. Along the way, we will examine how we know what we know about history, who writes our stories, who reads them, and who preserves them.
–
May 2021 – The Affectivity and Politics of Aroma in China, with Jie Yang
This talk first traces the historical, methodological, and conceptual development of olfactory studies in China from a critical and anthropological perspective. It then uses the ways aroma is portrayed in the popular TV series The Legend of Zhenhuan as an example to discuss the multiple meanings and connection of aroma in people’s everyday life in China. While discussions of olfactory studies usually centers the scientific or symbolic dimensions of smell/incense/aroma, this class focuses on what aroma does; its pragmatic, affective, and performative significance in social and political life. Professor Yang specificlaly highlights the affective force of aroma as psycho-somatic-social contagion that ties individuals to broader cultural and political processes. Yang contends that such affective contagion is integral to the Chinese practice of holism, which contributes uniquely to the debate on the ontological turn in anthropology. The emphasis on ontological difference and people’s felt experience (of aroma) requires us to go beyond the representational framework for sociocultural differences (of a single world), for example, by engaging multisensory and multimodality ethnographic research to attend to the many “worlds”/ontologies.
–
April 26 – The Scent of Gan Eden: Olfaction in Judaism, with Nuri McBride
Scent plays an important role in most religions. Odour can reinforce our connection to a place and community. It can connect us to emotions and nostalgia, be used as a sacrifice and help create an environment of sacredness. While Judaism may not be the first religion most people think of when they think of religious scents, Judaism does, in fact, have a long history of religious aromatics. In this class, Nuri McBride will explore the Jewish spiritual understanding of breath, life, and scent. We will explore how scent was used both metaphorically and ritualistically in the Temple and post Temple periods, as well as ways in which aromatics are used today in contemporary Jewish communities all over the world.
–
April – Nose-first: practices of smell walking and smellscape mapping, with Dr. Kate McLean
We are surrounded by information every day in the form of scent, but how can we make sense of this in a world that focuses on visual data? How do we map that which is invisible to our eyes? “Nose-first” invites you to question the characteristics of smell and the human experience of smelling from an art and design perspective. This interactive workshop will take participants through several exercises before, during and after the online lecture that will aid you in developing a greater understanding of the odours around you and explore different ways to express the sensations you experience. You’ll consider your own ‘smell print’, the whiffs, pongs and fragrances of the everyday world, visualise your findings and upload them to a shared site. The online lecture will focus on two key aspects of the smellscape; its spatiality and temporality and will lead to a discussion and sharing of your posted findings.
–
March 22 – Smells, Miasma Theory, and Public Health, with Nuri McBride
Academic Nuri McBride explores the history of pandemic controls through ideas of “bad air” and miasmas. With a particular emphasis on the historical and practical trajectory of miasma theory, Nuri provides an in-depth exploration into how this conception of malodor evolved post-plague, continuing on into the 19th century with the Great Stink of London, and even into the 20th century’s battle with the Spanish Flu.
–
March 2021 – Olfactory Racism and the Atlantic World, With Andrew Kettler
This presentation uses smell as a frame of analysis for understanding constructions and perceptions of race and the environment in the age of Atlantic slavery. Academic Andrew Kettler shares the history of aromatic consciousness in the making of Atlantic-era resistance to the racialized olfactory discourses of state, religious and slave masters.
Please be advised that this talk broaches very difficult topics, and some of the historic images and texts in the presentation will have been originally created to be hurtful – even hateful – to targeted communities. We engage in this conversation in the interest of public discourse about racism and its relation to scent with the goal of understanding the underpinnings of racism in order to combat it.
–
February 2021 – An Olfactory Biopolitics: Nairobi, With Coltrane McDowell
“Those who control smell, the naming, the production, and the right to determine what is foul or fragrant, create an olfactory biopolitics.”
In An Olfactory Biopolitics: Nairobi, designer Coltrane McDowell will take you on a journey that spans two years of research, from Eindhoven to Nairobi, from rose farms to alcohol distillers, and from past examples of smell in urban design to its ramifications in modern cities. McDowell examines the role and ramifications of smell as a means of control using Nairobi as a case study for olfactory biopolitics.
–
February 15 – From Plague Preservative to Perfume, With Nuri McBride
There is no history of humanity without a concurrent narrative of death and destruction. Indeed, the stories that survive from Justinian Plague of the Byzantine Empire, the Black Death, and the Great Plagues of the 17th century are testaments to humanity’s struggle with unprecedented, unexpected destruction. And yet, where there is great fear, there is great inventiveness. Many resourceful would-be healers made heavy use of aromatics as plague preservatives, in some way triggering a societal obsession with scent. Nuri joins us for a historical look at how scent has played into perceptions of wellness, in this first part of a two part exploration of smell and public health.
–
January 25 – Smells Like Xenophobia: An Olfactory History of Otherness, With Nuri McBride
Academic Nuri McBride explores centuries of allusions to olfactive disgust in the rhetoric of hate in an olfactive history of Otherness. In this class we will explore the use of olfactive imagery in the rhetoric of prejudice, focusing on major reoccurring themes. We will examine scent as a tool for creating ‘in-group’ space and otherness, as well as discuss the science and growing philosophical discourse around why people blindly hate and the part olfaction may play.
–
2020 Series
Curated by Nuri McBride
November 16 – Scent Culture Theory 101, With Nuri McBride
Scent matters, not just as a commodity in perfume but as a cultural artefact. What smells we value as a society, which ones disgust, and how they’re used, are both formed and informed by our scent cultures. But what is a scent culture? How do we spot one when we smell it? Throughout the Institute of Art and Olfaction’s lecture series, Scent & Society, we will be examining how aromatics impact society as a whole and people within it. This will take us from historical hygiene practices, global trade, to religious beliefs, and beyond. To help you gain the most from these talks Series Curator, Nuri McBride, has created this primer to help you understand the theory behind scent history and sociological fragrance education.
–
September 18 – Scents of Mummification and Ancient Egyptian Afterlife, With Dora Goldsmith
Join PhD candidate in Egyptology Dora Goldsmith as she explores and reconstructs the scent of mummification ingredients, coffins and mummy garlands. Using examples from history, Dora will share information on the fragrant substances used during the process of mummification, the smells that defined the mummification chambers and tombs, and the scents that the ancient Egyptians themselves wished to be surrounded by in their life after death. We will also discuss the scent of coffins and mummy garlands and their religious significance. Following the lecture portion of this session, Dora will provide detailed insight into the ingredients, with visual examples.
–
September 15 – Xenophobia: An Olfactory History of Otherness, With Nuri McBride
For centuries people have used the language of olfaction to express their disgust and horror at the Other. Who the Other was has been flexible but the allusion to olfactive disgust remains eerily consistent in the rhetoric of hate to this day. Nuri McBride explores the use of olfactive imagery in the rhetoric of prejudice, focusing on major reoccurring themes. We will examine scent as a tool for creating ‘in-group’ space and otherness, as well as discuss the science and growing philosophical discourse around why people blindly hate and the part olfaction may play.
–
August 3 – Smells Like Xenophobia: An Olfactive History of Otherness, With Nuri McBride
–
June 23 – The Putrid and the Divine: The Magical Scent of Christian Saints, With Nuri McBride
–
May 11 – Scent and Public Health: Part Two; Smells and Miasma Theory, With Nuri McBride
–
May 4 – Scent and Public Health Part One: From Plague Preservative to Perfume, With Nuri McBride
2018 Series
Curated by Dana El Masri
Scent and Society originated in 2018 as a collaboration between the IAO and Dana El Masri. Designed to show the multiplicity of scent culture, it took the form of a month-long program devoted to exploring scent in Southeast Asia and North Africa, as well as a follow up presentation.
September 14, 2018 – Scent in Social Ritual: Southwest Asia + North Africa, With Dana El Masri
In this session, Dana will lead us on an exploration of the role of scent in social ritual in countries in the Southwest Asia (also known as the Middle East) and North Africa, including Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Morocco, Sudan, the UAE, and Oman. Dana will share anecdotes and historical research into uses of scent in diverse social rituals while discussing the deep and troubling history of orientalism and fetishism vis-à-vis the Arabic speaking world. Dana will also share contemporary projects exploring the ideas and feelings of exile, the ever-present plight of the immigrant, and the realities of how people are living their identities in an increasingly fractured world (with a special mention of Ashraf Osman’s ‘Scents of Exile’ project.) This talk is presented as part of IAO’s Scent and Society series.
–
May 1 – 31, 2018 – Scent and Society: Southwest Asia and North Africa
Curated by Dana El Masri
During the month of May, 2018 the IAO joins forces with independent perfumer and writer Dana El Masri to present a series of workshops, talks, happenings and events exploring the multiplicity of traditions – and modern interpretations – of aromatic practices in Southwest Asia and North Africa.
Scent is a strong focal point in languages and cultures from the SWANA region, and is deeply embedded in almost every aspect of living. Dana El Masri collaborates with artists, poets, and thinkers to lead an exploration of the roles of scent from regions and cultures as diverse as Iraq, Tunisia, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, the UAE, Oman, and others. Over the course of a month, we will present this broad look at the history of Arabic scent culture through hands-on workshops, historical and cultural talks, and artists-in-residence.
Guest speakers and presenters:
Susu Attar:
Exhibition at IAO Gallery
April Banks:
Tea from Afar, poetry and tea
Omar Offendum:
Poetry and Spoken Word
John Steele:
Scents in Ancient Egypt
Dana El Masri:
“Oriental” category workshops (exploring alternatives for the name)
Blending workshop
THANK YOU