Wine Culture: Growing Together on the Vine

This semester, I spent a considerable amount of time studying wine and the culture which
surrounds this beverage of kings and paupers Through my e!periences I collected during this
pro"ect, I have grown as a wine enthusiast, learned what it takes to make wine, and have
e!amined those who have wrapped themselves up in the immense and rich culture of wine in the
#$st century %mong the many aspects of wine culture which has evolved in the &nited 'tates,
the one which I have found most fascinating is the ways in which it can be incredibly e!clusive
while at the same time being incredibly welcoming and unifying
Whenever someone hears the words (wine tasting) images of men in tu!edos crystal
wine stems and high price tags and even a certain kind of pretentious attitude come to mind In
%merica, wine is synonymous with a certain e!clusivity of social class The elite wine collecting,
dinner party and fine dining group associated with wine culture is a stark contrast to the everyday
wine drinker who opens the ne!t bottle with the same e!citement as the last he drank *or the
everyday drinker there is no such thing as an (important) wine, but instead there are only wines
you like and wines you dislike *or these casual drinkers their consumption of wine is not based
on the social class which they might reach or the rarity of the vintage, but rather what they want
to share with their friends, whatever wine they are interested in at the moment In this way, we
see the stark contrast between a strictly business group and a pleasure seeking group, but both
can be considered part of the wine culture of the &nited 'tates
The guardian of this social elite wine standard is called the 'ommelier, a man or woman
who has devoted their entire career to being a sort of wine guide through everything you could
ever know about wine 'ommelier is a *rench term, most say middle *rench, which was the
person in charge of the transportation of goods or the organi+ing of packs of animals
'ommeliers today are the embodiment of this e!clusive social (club) I learned in the movie
('omm) that 'ommeliers spend their entire life trying to keep up with the elite wine culture
which changes daily, knowing about vineyards around the world at the drop of a hat and being
able to taste the wine and know everything about it in that instant 'ommeliers tend to be hired as
wine e!perts at restaurants or vineyards, because of their impeccable knowledge of wines,
wineries, vineyards, and all things related to wine
%nother part of the elite wine culture is understanding what wines pair well with what
foods This is most commonly seen at fine dining restaurants and dinner parties Considering
most people don,t host or go to dinner parties very often, nor do most people fre-uent fine dining
establishments, most people in the &nited 'tates do not know what wines go with what foods
%dmittedly, all I knew of wine pairings before this pro"ect was that red wine goes well with red
meat and a white wine goes well wish fish and chicken There are entire groups of people who
devote their time to wine and food clubs which taste certain wines and then decide what foods
would pair well with those wines These groups do not consist of the average man, but instead
include the type of people who can afford to house elaborate dinner parties .ot only does the
food you pair wine with matter, but so does the glass in which you serve it It is considered to be
lowbrow to put the wrong drink in the wrong glass, or to put ice cubes in your wine
/any people in this elitist wine culture tend to collect wines, preserving the more
valuable vintages for special occasions They stock up on special wines, keeping them in
temperature controlled wine cellars until the wines age to a perfect maturity These aged wines
cost significantly more than the wines which are used for dinner parties or for every day
drinking, and can become a sort of status of class for these collectors 0ere, in the wine cellars of
the wealthy, is where I begin to formulate my theory on wine culture as a great divider and a
unifier all at once It constitutes a divider in the way it forms social classes, it,s natural ability to
separate communities into elite collectors and our every day drinkers In the same way it divides,
wine has also been considered a great unifier, gathering communities and bringing groups
together as a catalyst for social interaction
%lthough wine is a valuable substance which can be bought, traded, and hidden away for
safe keeping, wine is more fre-uently used as a beverage, and at one time in history, was more
common than even available drinking water When interviewing 1r 0aldeman at &.C
Charlotte, I asked him about his own personal wine cellar 0e told me that his wine cellar was
somewhat sad looking, considering he usually brings wines back from his travels but he has not
had the opportunity to travel this spring yet When I asked him what his most special wine in his
collection was, his response was (What collection2 The most special wine is the wine I will drink
ne!t, whatever wine that may be I do not collect wine, I drink it) This sort of adamancy in
opposition to the collection of wine fascinated me 'imilarly, I found that when I was listening to
the Wine Crush radio, the host continually repeated (1rink what you like, not what you are told)
This idea furthers the culture of wine as an en"oyable affair, not a strict adherence to a rule The
more I thought on his insistence on drinking wine rather than collecting it, the more I started to
reali+e that although there are clear lines drawn between wine cultures of the elite and the
common man, the same thing brings them both to the sub"ect of wine: human interaction
Whether we are using wine to show off our social class or we are using it as a social aid,
wine has been part of the life of mankind since it was first discovered somewhere around 3444
5C6 We have gathered around tables for centuries, en"oying food and wine amongst friends,
business partners, and our families Wine, whether used to further your standings in your society,
or to further your relationship with your community, is undeniably critical to our building of
society
In .orth Carolina, the small town of Clemmons hosts an annual Wine *estival where
local winemakers gather together and show off their hard work, while the community comes and
supports these small businesses % festival which is centered around wine might as well be a
festival centered around community It takes a community to even make the wine, from growing
the grape all the way to bottling the finished product .o one man can do this entire process
alone %fter the wine is completed, it takes people to sell the wines, spread them around the
region, country, or the world *rom each community springs another community, and every time
a bottle of wine is placed in the hands of an individual, he or she may choose to build his
community with it or further his or her own social status with it Wine is a powerful tool which
has been used to grow societies for centuries
I have come to understand the wine culture in %merica to be similar to a grape vine, from
where it all begins The roots of the vine are the vineyards, growing the grapes, creating and
bottling the wine The vine is the transportation of the wine, sending it out to local communities
and communities far away 5ut the communities themselves are represented by the grapes and
the leaves The vine itself would be useless without the community, the leaves and the grapes,
and similarly the leaves and the grapes cannot function without one another The two very
distinct wine cultures we see in the &nited 'tates need one another to define themselves and to
create their communities Without the elite collector type of communities, or the grape
communities, the drinking for en"oyment groups, or the leaves, would have no one to distinguish
themselves against If there were only collector groups then no one would be drinking the wine,
and the vineyards would not have a business Wine was meant for appreciating and en"oying,
both by savoring and drinking freely If these two different groups did not e!ist in wine culture of
%merica, there may not be much of a culture at all Together, both sides create the wine culture
which is e!perienced in the &nited 'tates We may be different parts of the vine, but together, we
all grow on the same vine and are critical to the development of the cultures in which we partake