Abstract
Coffee is an important commodity and an important comestible, one that is momentous not only for nations’ economies but also, at the micro-social level, as a resource for interpersonal sociability. Among a subculture of certain coffee connoisseurs, the coffee itself is a topic that is an organizing focus of, and for, that sociability. This paper is an empirical investigation of online narratives produced by hobbyist participants in what coffee aficionados refer to as the “third wave” coffee phenomenon and engages and challenges extant perspectives social aspects of “taste” by inspecting members’ insights concerning their conceptions of taste and their participation in a subculture that comprises taste as an important, central defining aspect. The analytic point of view deployed in this paper is ethnomethodological, one that, instead of emphasizing a priori the social structural characteristics of these connoisseurs as do Bourdieu (In: Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste, tr. Richard Nice, Routledge, New York 1984) and those who work in his tradition, emphasizes discovery of members’ own displayed understandings of the topic at hand. As such, this paper is more than an investigation of the “coffee geek” subculture but is also an invitation to an ethnomethodologically-informed sociology of “taste.”
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Altheide, D. L. (1987). Ethnographic content analysis. Qualitative Sociology, 10(1), 65–77.
Arjomand, S. (2004). Coffeehouses, guilds and oriental despotism government and civil society in late 17th to early 18th Century Istanbul and Isfahan, and as seen from Paris and London. European Journal of Sociology, 45(1), 23–42.
Baumann, S., & Johnson, J. (2009). Foodies: Democracy and distinction in the gourmet landscape. New York: Routledge.
Beighey, C., & Unnithan, N. P. (2006). Political rap: The music of oppositional resistance. Sociological Focus, 39(2), 133–143.
Bourdieu, P. (1984). Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste, tr. Richard Nice. New York: Routledge.
Bowman, B. (2008). Starbucks as demographic indicator. The Maynard Institute, http://www.mije.org/bobbibowman/starbucks.
Cowan, B. (2005). The social life of coffee: The emergence of the british coffeehouse. New Haven: Yale University Press.
DiMaggio, P., & Ostrower, F. (1990). Participation in the arts by black and white americans. Social Forces, 68(3), 753–778.
Dimaggio, P., & Useem, M. (1978). Social class and arts consumption: The origins and consequences of class differences in exposure to the arts in America. Theory and Society, 5(2), 141–161.
Francis, D., & Hester, S. (2004). An invitation to ethnomethodology: Language, society, and interaction. London: Sage Publictations.
Garfinkel, H. (1967). Studies in ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Gold, J. (2008). La mill: The latest buzz. LA Weekly, http://www.laweekly.com/2008-03-13/eat-drink/the-latest-buzz.
Haine, W. (1996). The world of the Paris café: Sociability among the French working class, 1789–1914. London: John Hopkins University Press.
Heritage, J. (1984). Garfinkel and ethnomethodology. Cambridge, UK: Polity.
Komecoglu, U. (2005). The publicness and sociabilities of the ottoman coffeehouse. Javnost/The Public, 12(2), 5–22.
Laurier, E., Whyte, A., & Buckner, K. (2001). An ethnography of a neighbourhood café: Informality, table arrangements and background noise. Journal of Mundane Behavior, 2(2), 195–232.
Levine, L. W. (1988). Highbrow/Lowbrow: The emergence of cultural hierarchy in America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Lyons, J. (2005). ‘Think seattle, act globally’: Specialty coffee, commodity biographies and the promotion of place. Cultural Studies, 19(4), 14–34.
Milligan, M. (1998). Interactional past and potential: The social construction of place attachment. Symbolic Interaction, 21(1), 1–33.
Oldenburg, R. (1991). The great good place. New York: Paragon House.
Oldenburg, R. (2000). Celebrating the third place: Inspiring stories about the "Great Good Places" at the heart of our communities. New York: Marlowe & Company.
Peterson, R., & Kern, R. (1996). Changing highbrow taste: From snob to omnivore. American Sociological Review, 61(5), 900–907.
Talbot, J. (2004). Grounds for agreement: The political economy of the coffee commodity chain. Oxford, UK: Rowman and Littefield.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Manzo, J. Coffee, Connoisseurship, and an Ethnomethodologically-Informed Sociology of Taste. Hum Stud 33, 141–155 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-010-9159-4
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-010-9159-4