National Post (National Edition)
BREW
Why the language of craft beer is in for some changes.
`Imagine it. It's a hot summer day. You're six and someone has given you a Mr. Freezie. I think it's purple. And you've done that thing that every kid does where you suck all the flavour out and there's a little bit at the bottom. It's got that distinct memory of purple freezie — that's what this beer reminds me of.”
When Ren Navarro talks about beer, she talks about experiences. This particular beer was a fruited sour, but no matter the style, her approach is the same. Leading with the concrete over the abstract during tastings, she invites people into the world of craft beer with a humanness that can't be achieved with a flavour wheel.
Exploring the effects of different hop varieties, brewing techniques and terroir is all well and good, but for drinkers new to craft beer, it can be a discouraging way to start. As a diversity educator, craft beer consultant and founder of Beer Diversity, Navarro takes an interactive approach when advocating for inclusion.
“I'm not talking at people — I'm talking with people,” she says, adding that she prefers to start with the experiential rather than the technical. “To be like, `Hey, we talk in jargon when we get together and we talk in shorthand, and that alienates people. And they don't want to come and try the beer, or they don't want to try and be part of this community that we say is so open and welcoming. So how do we describe things?”
In its use of words such as dry, sweet, fruity, floral, sulphuric, aroma or mouthfeel, the language of craft beer has borrowed from the language of wine, says Lex Konnelly, a PhD candidate in the University of Toronto's Department of Linguistics. Beer descriptions communicate what consumers can expect when drinking the product, but also convey how much information they're assumed to have or not have.
Beer has shifted from a working-class beverage to elite commodity, Konnelly explains in their paper recently published in the academic journal Language & Communication. By speaking the language of so-called beer snobs, brutoglossia (“craft beer talk”) can perpetuate inequalities.
Taste is far from arbitrary. It's wrapped up in social status, which is in turn influenced by other categories such as gender and racial identity. Language is one of the ways people define the in-group and out-group.
“It's really fascinating because you don't have a lingo test in order to enjoy a beer,” Konnelly says, laughing. “But when you have a description that's presented in this very interesting, sometimes very technical or goofy way, it raises the question of what kind of target audience is being constructed here? Who is this for?”
In the course of their research, Konnelly evaluated how craft breweries in the Greater Toronto Area describe their companies and beers, and looked at how the language of connoisseurship plays into the accessibility of artisanal goods.
As a craft beer drinker and linguist, the seed for Konnelly's investigation into craft beer talk was planted when their friends started sharing what they referred to as “funny beer descriptions.” Some they identified as being “especially pretentious” or “oozing fanciness”; others had a slapstick quality.
“It was almost like these two poles of ultra-serious and ultra-goofy, and that was something that I found to be really interesting throughout the course of my research too,” says Konnelly. “How breweries navigate between those two oppositions to create something really, really interesting in their marketing.”
This awareness was paired with increased representation of beer snobs in popular culture, especially within the last seven or eight years, Konnelly says. They recall the cover of a 2014 issue of The New Yorker magazine. The illustration features a bearded server — dressed in a plaid shirt and jeans, white bar towel draped over his forearm, knit toque on his head. In presenting a bottle of beer to a discerning patron as a sommelier would a fine wine, it becomes “fancy” simply by association.
Stereotypical images of the beer-drinking hoser — popularized by fictional brothers Bob and Doug McKenzie on SCTV, torch carried by Letterkenny — now coexist, and even mingle, with those of the hipster.
While many craft breweries counter these stereotypes by promoting their products as being for everyone, this raises an important question, Konnelly says: Who is everyone?
Even as cultural tides turn, diversity and inclusion in craft beer is moving slowly. Decades of marketing beer as a beverage for working-class white men has proven hard to overcome. According to Konnelly's paper, beer is still brewed and drunk predominantly by white men: 75 per cent of weekly craft beer drinkers are men; 60 per cent white, 2016 statistics showed.
Nonetheless, craft brewers tend to express their egalitarianism in creative ways, Konnelly says. By marketing their beers democratically, in some cases sharing their brewing recipes and processes, and emphasizing hyperlocalism — even in big cities, pinpointing their location to the nearest intersection — they attempt to shake off the elitism associated with prestige consumerism.
“But still the issue is that not anybody can get into craft beer in this way,” says Konnelly. “Even if you might not have a lingo test to be able to enjoy a beer, in order to be able to meaningfully interpret that description, you have to have access to it in the first place.”
When Navarro started working in beer eight years ago as a sales rep, women were a rarity in the industry. (Konnelly references a 2017 study in their paper that found only 29 per cent of brewery workers are women.) Change is coming, Navarro adds, but in baby steps.
“There's definitely a heck of a lot more women than there were before and there are more BIPOC folks working in beer. But when I say there's more, it's relative,” says Navarro. “I hope that it doesn't take another eight years to say, `Well, now this group is more represented.' But I think that it will take time.”
Diversity in beer isn't just about people, she adds. There's also been a shift in the kinds of beers people make. Merit Brewing in Hamilton, Ont., for example, is experimenting with wine ingredients in its Either Way Gewürztraminer-style lager. Brewers are using chai spices and cardamom, mango, passion fruit and guava — everyday ingredients to some, mind-blowing to others.
“For those who have always felt left out or excluded, they're like, `Hey, that's my jam. I grew up with that,'” says Navarro. “The stereotypes you see are the bearded hipster with his flannel jacket drinking a lager while chopping down a tree or snowboarding. But it's nice now that when you hear these other ingredients, that's not who you think of.”
When Aaron Prothro founded Toronto's Mascot Brewery in 2015, he knew he was filling a void. Immersed in the craft beer scene, he hadn't seen many people who looked like him. Channelling his Nova Scotia background, his approach to craft beer is rooted in inclusivity, conviviality and a relaxed state of mind.
“There were no other Black owners,” Prothro recalls. “And I'm a pretty behind-the-scenes type of guy. I don't like to put myself out there that much, but now I feel more of a duty to be out there. Because I want to inspire other people who feel like no one really looks like them … that they could own a craft brewery too.”
When considering Mascot's beer descriptions, unpretentiousness is the primary goal, he says. Steering clear of technical jargon, they speak plainly about their products without oversimplifying in an effort to appeal to as wide a range of customers as possible.
People gravitate towards craft beer for different reasons, Prothro adds, and he believes that given the relative youth of the industry as well as its growth potential, there's more than enough room for breweries to cater to “super-enthusiasts, explorers, loyal customers,” or any combination of the three.
He sees the monetary barrier preventing some people from accessing craft beer as “a complicated conundrum.” Sourcing ingredients, buying and maintaining equipment, and aging craft beer comes at a cost, and prices need to be in line with that effort. The “more eloquent, sophisticated” language some breweries use is a way of communicating value to customers.
“The way that we position Mascot is, we understand the process that we need to have: the quality of ingredients that we need to source; the flavour profiles that we need to create, and how to manipulate the ingredients and processes to get those; and the science behind yeast propagation and management. Even terroir of different hops,” he says. “But we package it in a way where it's digestible and fun, and more easy-going.”
For Shehan De Silva, founder of Toronto's Lost Craft, a commitment to diversity and inclusion has also been a core philosophy since he started the business in 2015.
“I grew up in Scarborough and I just personally felt that a lot of the craft beer marketing wasn't tailored to me. Particularly the people that you saw in social media content, etc. There was clearly a lack of diversity,” says De Silva.
The idea that Lost Craft's products are from Toronto but for everyone served as inspiration for what's become one of its most Instagrammed beers. In the shape of the CN Tower, Divercity Helles Lager features the word for diversity in 14 of the city's most-spoken languages.
The company is set on establishing itself as a local voice when it comes to highlighting issues of diversity and inclusion, De Silva says. To that end, Lost Craft recently formed a partnership with the Canadian Centre for Diversity and Inclusion (CCDI). In March, the proceeds of every can sold at the LCBO will be donated to the CCDI and future plans are in the works.
Lost Craft makes approachable products, De Silva says, and he agrees that craft beer lingo can be difficult for non-connoisseurs to decipher. Depending on the bar, asking for a lager could be frowned upon, and styles such as brut or Brett IPA, or kettle sour are pretty much meaningless to the average beer drinker.
It can feel intimidating, De Silva says, which is why when Lost Craft comes out with new styles — such as milkshake and brewed IPAs — they describe them clearly.
“If you come up with these terms and you don't explain what they are and you're elitist about that approach, it's obviously going to turn people away,” he says. “Our objective has always been to make sure that (everything we communicate) … is done in a way that the everyday person can accept and understand.”
The work they've been doing in promoting inclusion has made a difference, De Silva says. On Instagram, 45 per cent of Lost Craft's followers are women and when they started doing home deliveries during the pandemic, they were able to see the diversity in their clientele firsthand.
“I was pretty proud. It's not about selling more necessarily — you just feel like laying that groundwork from the outset seems to be resonating,” he says. “More broadly, it's to everyone's betterment. I want more people to drink Steam Whistle over Stella. It's better for everyone to expand the craft beer pie.”
De Silva, Prothro, Konnelly and Navarro all agree that if consumers value diversity and inclusion in craft beer, they should ask questions and support breweries making diverse initiatives a priority in a sincere way.
Craft beer talk is just one manifestation of a deeper need for cultural change, Konnelly emphasizes: “If a brewery is invested in making craft beer more accessible for everyone, and if they really do want to change the landscape of the industry, and make it a more affirming place, there will be more evidence of that than just what they have written on the side of the can.”