Untapped: Exploring the Cultural Dimensions of Craft Beer


Edited by Nathaniel G. Chapman, J. Slade Lellock, and Cameron D. Lippard 

May 2017
PB 978-1-943665-68-6
HC 978-1-943665-67-9
ePub 978-1-943665-69-3
PDF 978-1-943665-70-9



Untapped collects twelve previously unpublished essays that analyze the rise of craft beer from social and cultural perspectives.

In the United States, the United Kingdom, and Western Europe there has been exponential growth in the number of small independent breweries over the past thirty years – a reversal of the corporate consolidation and narrowing of consumer choice that characterized much of the twentieth century. While there are legal and policy components involved in this shift, the contributors to Untapped ask broader questions. How does the growth of craft beer connect to trends like the farm-to-table movement, gentrification, the rise of the “creative class,” and changing attitudes toward both cities and farms? How do craft beers conjure history, place, and authenticity? At perhaps the most fundamental level, how does the rise of craft beer call into being new communities that may challenge or reinscribe hierarchies based on gender, class, and race?



Ian Malcolm Taplin

Exploring the Cultural Dimensions of the Craft Beer Revolution: Introduction and Overview

Part I: Global Political Economy

1. Storytelling and Market Formation: An Exploration of Craft Brewers in the UK
Jennifer Smith Maguire, Jessica Bain, Andrea Davies, and Maria Touri

2. A Pint of Success: How Beer Is Revitalizing Cities and Local Economies in the United Kingdom
Ignazio Cabras

3. The Rationalization of Craft Beer from Medieval Monks to Modern Microbrewers: A Weberian Analysis
Michael A. Elliott

4. Entrepreneurial Leisure and the Microbrew Revolution: The Neoliberal Origins of the Craft Beer Movement
J. Nikol Beckham

Part II: Space and Place

5. Crafting Place: Craft Beer and Authenticity in Jacksonville, Florida
Krista E. Paulsen and Hayley E. Tuller

6. Ethical Brews: New England, Networked Ecologies, and a New Craft Beer Movement
Ellis Jones and Daina Cheyenne Harvey

7. Atmosphere and Activism at the Great British Beer Festival
Thomas Thurnell-Read

8. Neighborhood Change, One Pint at a Time: The Impact of Local Characteristics on Craft Breweries
Jesus Barajas, Geoff Boeing, and Julie Wartell

9. The Spatial Dynamics of Organizational Identity among Craft Brewers
Tünde Cserpes and Paul-Brian McInerney

Part III: Intersecting Identities

10. The Cultural Tensions Between Taste Refinement and Middle-Class Masculinity
Andre F. Maciel

11. You Are What You Drink: Gender Stereotypes and Craft Beer Preferences within the Craft Beer Scene of New York City
Helana Darwin

12. Brewing Boundaries of White/Middle-Class/Maleness: Reflections from Within the Craft Beer Industry
Erik T. Withers

List of Contributors


Nathaniel G. Chapman is an assistant professor of sociology in the department of behavioral sciences at Arkansas Tech University. His research focuses on craft beer and the production of culture in the United States. He has also researched racial dynamics at Electronic Dance Music (EDM) festivals, and EDM more broadly. Currently, he is conducting research on gender and consumption in the craft beer industry, and the construction of authenticity in craft brewing.

J. Slade Lellock is a PhD student in the department of sociology at Virginia Tech. His research interests include culture, digital sociology, consumption, taste, and qualitative methodologies. His work generally focuses on the symbolic and expressive realms of culture such as music, art, film, and dress as well as social and symbolic boundaries. Given his interest in the cultural dimensions of digital social life, he has conducted ethnographic fieldwork in multiple online communities.

Cameron D. Lippard is an associate professor of sociology at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. His teaching and research interests are in social inequality, focusing on the social problems and racialization Latino immigrants face while living in the American South. Recent publications include two books: Building Inequality: Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration in the Atlanta Construction Industry and Being Brown in Dixie: Race, Ethnicity, and Latino Immigration in the New South. He also has researched the connections between immigrant labor and growing industries in the American South including the construction, meatpacking, and Christmas tree industries.


"Untapped speaks to important aspects of beer and food culture. It is well researched and documented and adds to our understanding of a largely understudied field."
Carolyn Keller, Keene State College

"A valuable and teachable book that will appeal to anyone interested in social science perspectives on craft brewing."
Andrew Shears, Mansfield University


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