Hopeful they did it far from outhouses.
Dirt is loaded with parasites even today, in countries with poor sanitation.
So you’re telling me these dirt eaters have really strong immune systems
But did they have food allergies? Because there’s a theory that increases in good allergies are because we live sufficiently sanitary lives that some people’s immune systems basic go on a schizophrenic rampage whether somebody certain foods.
That’s what the cooking is for I imagine
It was common among black women in certain communities in rural Alabama and Mississippi - not a common nationwide practice of all americans.
As the old folk saying goes, you gotta eat a peck of dirt before you die
And spiders
I wonder if it’s because of iron deficiency.
I thought it was potassium.
Explains a lot
In South Epsteinia they eat dirt. And they only season it with salt and vinegar because they’re white.
peak south USA
I remember making mud pies as a kid. We never ate them though.
I knew some animals would “eat” dirt once in a while, but this sounds like desperate hunger to me
More likely pica which is a symptom of severe iron or other nutrient deficiency.
Man that make some scenes in Yellowjacket make so much more sense…
When I read about this practice a long time ago it was talked about more as an eccentric preference, like gum or tictacs, not a desperate means of nourisment - although it might have been driven by deficiency cravings. And what I’ve read about it didn’t mention baking, so it seems like a great way to ingest parasites.
I was baffled no one wrote here WHY anyone would do this. Here’s the answer from the article:
Researchers say those who eat dirt do not do so to satisfy hunger or to meet a biochemical urge to acquire certain metals or minerals that might be missing from the diet. Rather, they do so because the practice has been learned culturally. Links Are Traced to West Africa
Dr. Frate said dirt eating is one of the few customs surviving among some Southern blacks that can be directly traced to ancestral origins in West Africa. Dirt-eating is common among some tribes in Nigeria today.
According to his research, Dr. Frate said it was not uncommon for slave owners to put masks over the mouths of slaves to keep them from eating dirt. The owners thought the practice was a cause of death and illness among slaves, when they were more likely dying from malnutrition.
The cause of the cultural behavior usually has a purpose though.
Thanks for citing this, but it still doesn’t explain why this custom has developed.
The most likely explanation is that kaolinite clay is known to reduce nausea and diarrhea.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/public-health/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2022.893831/full
I compost and a common practice is to throw a handful of your native soil into your pile when you start it, to inoculate it with local soil bacteria. Bacteria do most of the work in an active compost pile.
I wonder if people were getting some kind of gut flora benefit from this.
I wonder this exact thing, given that soil is a living organism full of beneficial bacteria and other organic materials. The food we eat consumes it, takes what it needs, and then we do the same.
I find it also interesting that while the article claims this is a cultural thing vs. being done for heath benefits, I’d argue it became cultural because of a universal understanding of health benefits.
Now I’m not saying this is some long lost concept that is the missing key to fix all our ills, however I can see how consuming soil was an integral part of maintaining gut health and boosting immunity way before we understood how those systems work.
Yeah I don’t see an answer, but it is possible that it is chemical and not about flora, because I keep seeing “clay” mentioned specifically, instead of “soil.”
I agree that just saying “it’s cultural” is not an explanation. Cultures are not entirely arbitrary.
Depending on the composition of the soil it might also have antiparasitic properties.
I can’t speak for these specific people, but I know that eating clay can absorb toxins, like the kinds of poisons plants make to stop you eating them. There’s also potentially mineral supplementation and introduction of beneficial bacteria.
But it’s not very safe to eat dirt in modern times because we’ve poisoned a lot of the soil with various substances. You can buy edible dirt which is known to be safe.
That’s true for a lot of customs.
What rational reason is there for people to eat cereal for breakfast?
Cereal was designed to prevent masturbation.
Yeah pour it in the trousers!
Then why are they called Apple Jacks?!
That’s why I rub out a fat one first and THEN eat the cereal.
That’ll show kellogg
I’d say it does a pretty good job. I hardly ever jack off while eating Cheerios in the morning.
Cream of Wheat, not cream of meat.
There’s always a reason, but it doesn’t need to be entirely rational. Kellogg was a nut, but that’s a different topic, no?
In clinic, this is called pica.
Dirt is full of streptomyces species and spores. It’s why dirt smells like dirt. Those species produce most of our antibiotics.
thats why its called Humus, and not HUMMUS. eating dirt is a good way to get infections, especially parasites, like raccoon roundworm.
Can those survive the baking process?
You know, this explains a lot about the South…
Dirt (especially clay) is often rich in iron and magnesium. Humans used to use ceramic pottery extensively until recently. It wouldn’t surprise me if there were some benefits.
So here in Russia there’s such a thing as dachas, it’s small plots of land with non-winterproof (sometimes not) small houses (sometimes more like a chickhouse for a human) on them, people go there at summer to have barbecues, grow stuff, have fun.
We have that, it’s on a place with a lot of clay (good for growing apple trees, too) and I have always felt weird from eating and drinking anything with local water (from the well, boiled).
That is, I have ASD and BAD, and my mental condition is always different when being there a lot with that water, it’s both more intense emotions, but also less like BAD symptoms. Also that somehow makes me feel full faster. And stronger.
Honestly it’s as if in the city I had BAD, but there I had BPD. I become more touchy-feely there. Still it feels good and human, just not very safe.
But I’ve also read that water with such contents is not too good for one’s kidneys, shouldn’t overdo it. Better use filters.
The point is, I do feel as if my nutrition were better when using that water. Even a few portions of rice a day with lots of tea feel quite different there. But might also be the cleaner air, it’s a relatively low place, though not a swamp, and a very pretty one.
Several of my great aunts and uncles did this. And yeah, after they moved away they would have small boxes of dirt shipped to them from family that stayed behind.
White, Volga German descended farmer people, moved from the Midwest to the West Coast US.
My wife told me her mom used to eat a bit of dirt when pregnant.
