Episode 200: How Beer Changed the World | Jeffrey Pilcher on History, Capitalism, and Craft Brewing
Episode Summary
Historian and food studies scholar Jeffrey Pilcher joins Reckoning with Jason Herbert to explore the surprising global history of beer and how one of humanity’s oldest drinks became a worldwide commodity. Drawing from his new book Hopped Up: How Travel, Trade, and Taste Made Beer a Global Commodity, Pilcher traces beer’s journey from ancient brewing traditions to modern craft breweries, revealing how beer shaped—and was shaped by—capitalism, industrialization, migration, empire, advertising, and working-class culture.
In this episode, we discuss the origins of brewing in the ancient world, the rise of lager and Pilsner in Central Europe, German immigration and American beer culture, the globalization of brands like Heineken and Corona, and the explosion of craft brewing in the United States. Along the way, we dive into Czech beer halls, IPAs, bourbon barrel stouts, the politics of drinking, and why beer has always been about more than what’s in the glass.
If you love history, food culture, globalization, craft beer, or simply a great conversation about the human need for community and connection, this episode is for you.
About Jeffrey Pilcher
Jeffrey Pilcher has been a leading figure in the emerging scholarly field of food history. From an early research focus on Mexico and Latin America, he has expanded his scope to food in world history. He is the author of ¡Que vivan los tamales! Food and the Making of Mexican Identity (1998), The Sausage Rebellion: Public Health, Private Enterprise, and Meat in Mexico City (2006), and Food in World History (2006). His latest book, Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (2012), seeks to historicize authenticity and show how Mexico’s national cuisine developed through global interactions, particularly with Mexican American cooks.
Professor Pilcher is the articles editor for a new, peer-reviewed journal called Global Food History, which is published by Bloomsbury. He also edited the Oxford Handbook of Food History (2012) and a four-volume anthology from Bloomsbury entitled Food History: Critical and Primary Sources (2014).
His current book project examines the world history of beer over the past two hundred years, following the spread of European lager through networks of trade, migration, and empire. The research moves between the global and the local to explore how European brews became situated within the drinking cultures of Mexican pulque, Japanese sake, and South African sorghum beer, among others.
At UTSC, Professor Pilcher will teach classes on the history of food and drink as well as Mexico, Latin America, and pirates of the Caribbean. He has a BS in mathematics and computer science from the University of Illinois, an MA in Mexican history from New Mexico State University, and a PhD in Mexican cultural history from Texas Christian University. He has taught at The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina, the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, and the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, Italy.