Bean Buzz

Back in 1991, I was working at a movie theater, and my co-worker Adina turned me on the Henry Rollins via his Black Coffee Blues book. Not only did I find appreciation for the tattooed orator, but also a taste for the black blood of the coffee gods. In that same year coffee consumption was barely half of what it was 30 years earlier.

In 1962, the average person had 3.2 cups per day, but had fallen to 1.75 cups. So what lead to the modern, ubiquitous Starbucks, etc. presence? A resurgent coffee culture. And how did that happen? Thank advertising giant Ogilvy and Mather, who was employed by Maxwell House. Their solution to the drying coffee market was to segment the product by quality, value and personal image, and it's just one of many interesting points in a three-part series on the anthropology of coffee at the blog Anthropology in Practice.

The first part describes how coffee became a necessary part of our morning existence. The second follows the history of the coffee bean in human culture. And the third addresses the social role of coffee in creating a culture of productivity.