A spectre is haunting the wine world – the spectre of labels. My apologies to Marx. His spectre – that of communism – was something feared and resisted by the old guard, and thus to be welcomed. The spectre I am referring to is the old guard and thus perhaps a spectre to be exorcised. The terms we use to describe wine – the labels – are a spectre I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. To be blunt, are they more limiting than...
Read MoreReaders of this blog, and those who have heard me speak at conferences, will know that my relationship with the language wine people use is complicated. There are often reasons for the words we use, but those reasons are not always self-evident. Nor do we do a very good job of making this known, and explaining what those words are intended to convey. In many ways, and many times, wine language is coterminous with, but not equal to,...
Read MoreI wondered, back in December, if certain kinds of tasting notes were soulless. I want to return to this point, and take it in a slightly different direction. I want to think about the ways in which tasting notes can be unduly restrictive.One of the starting points for this is further reflection on the WSET fortified wines exam I sat about a month ago, and in particular, one of the wines, an Oloroso sherry. The other starting point is...
Read MoreComing soon – a new, semi-regular addition to our blog.Have you ever wondered what the descriptions on the back of a wine bottle, or the tasting notes in your local wine shop actually mean? Then the Wine Decoder is for you.Using real examples, we’ll help you get the most out of picking and understanding wine. Learn why some wines smell like green apples, others like bubblegum, and others like bacon. Learn why some tannins...
Read MoreI have a problem with ‘natural wine.’ The more I think about ‘natural wine,’ the more I object to it. There is nothing natural about it. As an anthropologist, I think it needs to be consigned to the compost heap.Now that I have your attention, let me be clear: I am very sympathetic to the philosophy behind what is often called ‘natural wine.’ I’m running a research project that focuses in large part on it. It is the term itself I...
Read MoreThe ideas behind this post are still vague phantoms that refuse to take concrete form, but as I tell my students, writing is often a good way of thinking ideas through. What I am trying to think through here is the concept of ‘translating the senses.’ The fact that we should be paying attention to other senses than the visual is fairly well-established in anthropology and related fields, even if it is perhaps more honoured in the...
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