Tasting Qualities: The Past and Future of Tea

Atelier: Ethnographic Inquiry in the Twenty-First Century

by Sarah Besky

What is the role of quality in contemporary capitalism? How is a product as ordinary as a bag of tea judged for its quality? In her innovative study, Sarah Besky addresses these questions by going inside an Indian auction house where experts taste and appraise mass-market black tea, one of the world’s most recognized commodities. Pairing rich historical data with ethnographic research among agronomists, professional tea tasters and traders, and tea plantation workers, Besky shows how the meaning of quality has been subjected to nearly constant experimentation and debate throughout the history of the tea industry. Working across fields of political economy, science and technology studies, and sensory ethnography, Tasting Qualities argues for an approach to quality that sees it not as a final destination for economic, imperial, or post-imperial projects but as an opening for those projects.

 

Genres: Tea, Sociology, Nonfiction, Food

256 pages, Hardcover

Published May 12, 2020

About the author

Dr Sarah Besky is the Charles Evans Hughes 1881 Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology and the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University. From 2012-2015, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the Michigan Society of Fellows. She received a PhD from the Department of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2012.

Her areas of interest are: labor, environment, commodities, agriculture, plantations, ethical trade, gender, development, Himalayas, India, environmental justice and ethics.

Reviews

[Natalie]

Part history, part memoir this book will appeal to tea aficionados as much as academic audiences in the fields of ethnography, business, and anyone with an interest in global markets.

The scene setting was terrific. Some of the content may feel a bit dull if tea is not your THING, but if it is, you will certainly enjoy this look at the tea industry, its history, and what makes the price of tea and its availability move on the market.

There's a great review at Aravinda Anantharaman with lots of detail that really engaged my curiosity about this book.

I received an advanced reader copy of the book Tasting Qualities: The Past and Future of Tea from the NetGalley so I could write an honest review.

[Catherine]

I have a rule that I don't rate books I read for work, but can I just say that this book is *great*? It's both fascinating and extremely readable. Who knew I'd be getting emotional about Indian tea auctions.