The History of the World in Six Glasses - Essay Example

Write a four page paper that uses the book the History of the World in Six Glasses to do the following: Take a beverage in the book and describe its development and influence on social, cultural and political and economic events The role of certain beverages in history have symbolised more than the appetite to quench thirst and Tom Standage’s “History of the World in Six Glasses”(2005) is an original perspective of human history through certain beverages. The central underlying hypothesis of Standage’s book is that from the Stone Age, each era has had a signature beverage that has been intrinsically intertwined with socio-cultural and political developments and thereby undertaken the role of a defining beverage in a decisive historical period. Moreover, Standage’s hypothesis suggests that each defining beverage evaluated in the book is in itself a technological mode, providing a trigger for cultural development; which in turn underlines the interaction of various civilisations. In essence, Standage firstly considers the development of agriculture from hunting as a pre-cursor to the development of beer. Secondly, he refers to fact that Greek’s used grapes to create wine, which was then copied by the Romans and Christians. The Arabic society introduced spirits as a companion to long journeys and the Arabs also introduced coffee to Europe, which “became the intellectual counterpoint to the geographical expansion of the Age of Exploration” (Standage, 2005). Standage then refers to the development of tea from China to the popularity in the British Industrial Revolution, which was the “lubricant that kept the factories running smoothly” (Standage 200). Finally, Standage uses the history of Coca-Cola to discuss the rise of the American Capitalism model. With regard to tea, Standage charts the history of tea from the Chinese, fourteenth century tea ceremonies in Korea to the tea plantations in Sri Lanka and use of the tea trade in Britain. Essentially, Standage argues that “The story of tea is the story of imperialism, industrialization and world domination one cup at a time.” (p. 177). Firstly, Standage refers to the Chinese tradition of tea, which is most likely to have commenced in the 7th Century BC. Originally used as a medicinal purpose; the silk routes resulted in the simultaneous popularity of Buddhism and Tea. In China, tea then became the national drink in the Tang Dynasty and became economically important in being utilised as currency. The economic impact was further signified by the Tea tax. Similarly, in the Ming Dynasty, China had become the most powerful world naval force, with Admiral Zheng leading Chinese ships to Vietnam, Java, Sumatra, India and Sri Lanka, where tea became a central trading item. As such, the development of the tea trade highlights the economic power of tea, which simultaneously had a concomitant impact in spreading the religions of Buddhism and Taoism. However, whilst China was the major catalyst in developing the tea trade, during the end of the Ming dynasty, China became isolated through governmental policies geared towards enhancing national stability. In contrast, the West was undergoing rapid political and cultural change with the Renaissance, reformation and the new world exploration. The long term ramifications of this effectively fuelled a weakening Chinese state in terms of the technology and warfare to defend itself from European control. For example, early European missionaries and Jesuit monks in China were influenced by the tea drunk by Buddhist monks, which in turn highlights the influence of religion on the development of tea as the Jesuit missionaries advocated the advantages of tea throughout Europe. With regard to the British Empire, the ability to make inroads into the tea trade took a little longer as evidenced by China’s control of the tea trade in China. Evans highlights the point that when British traders approached the Chinese leadership in the end of the eighteenth century for trade concessions, they were rebuffed resulting in relative autonomy for the Chinese in contrast to India. This resulted in the British Empire focusing its efforts regarding the tea trade in India, with factories established in India. However, in the first twenty years of the British East India Company, trade in Asia was predominantly controlled by the Dutch and as a result, tea took longer to come to Britain. Additionally, when tea first arrived in Britain, its popularity was limited to the upper classes due to the high price. Gradually inroads were made and by the 18th century, there was a growing demand for tea, resulting in the first tea house being opened by Thomas Twining. The tea house was culturally significant in making a change from the popularity of coffee houses in London and Twining also permitted unchaperoned women to purchase tea, which had previously been prohibited. Therefore the use of tea was clearly intertwined with social change. However, the mass popularity of tea in England was crystallised by the Industrial revolution in Britain. The industrial revolution and the first quarter of the nineteenth century saw Britain at the heart of a seismic societal shift as a result of mass population migration to the towns, resulting in urbanisation The long hours and requirement for a workforce in the industrial revolution catalysed the use of tea by the masses as “Factory workers had to function like parts in a well-oiled machine, and tea was the lubricant that kept the factories running smoothly.” (Standage 200). Therefore the use of tea for factory workers in their breaks was encouraged to keep the workforce active and Standage argues that this resulted in “state sanctioned drug running on a massive scale, which created thousands of addicts and blighted countless lives merely to maintain Britain’s supply of tea.” (Standage 210). To this end, Standage further argues that the phenomenon of tea drinking in Britain is “not the cause, but the consequences of the distresses of the poor. The drink of queens had also become the drink of last resort… Tea had reached around the world from the world’s oldest empire and planted itself at the heart of the newest.” (Standage 196). Accordingly, the above analysis highlights that whilst tea has become a mass drink of popularity, Standage’s discussion of tea emphasises its role in imperialism, industrialisation and primacy of the Western world. This in turn developed tea as a cultural phenomenon for social interaction in addition to the coffee and is also intertwined with the religious development through the ages. From a contemporary perspective, the mass popularity of tea beyond the upper classes provided ripe opportunities for advertising in the inception of commercialised consumerism as highlighted by Standage. Moreover, interestingly tea appears to remain intertwined with socio-cultural developments as evidenced by the use of social networking. For example, the creation of multi-faceted digital space has seen a significant uptake by youth on a global scale, thereby perpetuating a domino effect on culture, sub-cultures and social behaviour through changing communication trends with social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Bebo (Cross 3). This has enabled increased individual autonomy in choosing modes of communication and has fuelled the role of the individual in public discourse. Moreover, this use of communication has been instrumental to businesses in marketing products as evidenced by tea company R. C. Bigelow’s use of blogging and social networking to market tea on Facebook. In discussing their use of this technological advance to market tea, Weber refers to the comments of R.C Bigelow’s CEO that “using the new media is an extension of a philosophy we already knew – take care of your customers, talk to them….how great is it to be able to see all kinds of people, with their own styles, wanting to talk about Bigelow Tea on the Internet?” (In Weber 212). Therefore this example further supports the hypothesis of Standage’s book that tea is effectively a microcosm for the interrelationship between socio-cultural change and political agendas in Western imperialism, but remains culturally significant in being used as an advertising tool in the cultural phenomenon of social networking. BIBLIOGRAPHY Cross, R. The Hidden Power of Social Networks: Understanding How Work Really Gets Done. Harvard Business School Press. 2004 Standage. T. A History of the World in Six Glasses Walker & Company, 2005. Weber, L. Marketing to the Social Web. Wiley, 2009. Read More