Crafting the Culture and History of French Chocolate

This absorbing narrative follows the craft community of French chocolatiers--members of a tiny group experiencing intensive international competition--as they struggle to ensure the survival of their businesses. Susan J. Terrio moves easily among ethnography, history, theory, and vignette, telling a story that challenges conventional views of craft work, associational forms, and training models in late capitalism. She enters the world of Parisian craft leaders and local artisanal families there and in southwest France to relate how they work and how they confront the representatives and structures of power, from taste makers, CEOs, and advertising executives to the technocrats of Paris and Brussels. Looking at craft culture and community from a cross-disciplinary perspective, Terrio finds that the chocolatiers affirm their collective identity and their place in the present by commemorating selectively their role in history. In addition to joining a distinguished tradition of American anthropological writing on the role of food, her study of the social production of taste in the invention of vintage, grand cru chocolates lends specificity and weight to theories of consumption by Pierre Bourdieu and others. The book will appeal to anthropologists, cultural studies scholars, and anyone curious about life in contemporary France. This narrative follows the craft community of French chocolatiers -- members of a tiny group experiencing intense international competition -- as they struggle to ensure the survival of their businesses. Susan J. Terrio moves easily among ethnography, history, theory, and vignette, telling a story that challenges conventional views of craft work, associational forms, and training models in late capitalism. She enters the world of craft leaders and local artisanal families in Paris and in southwest France to relate how they work and how they confront the representatives and structures of power, from tastemakers, CEOs, and advertising executives to the technocrats of Paris and Brussels.Looking at craft culture and community from a cross-disciplinary perspective, Terrio finds that the chocolatiers affirm their collective identity and their place in the present by commemorating selectively their role in history. In addition to joining a distinguished tradition of American anthropological writing on the role of food, her study of the social production of taste in the invention of vintage grand cru chocolates lends specificity and weight to theories of consumption by Pierre Bourdieu and others. The book will appeal to anthropologists, cultural studies scholars, and anyone curious about life in contemporary France. Contents......Page 8 List of Illustrations......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 12 1 Introduction......Page 16 2 Bread and Chocolate......Page 38 3 Reeducating French Palates......Page 55 4 Unsettling Memories: The Politics of Commemoration......Page 81 5 What’s in a Name?......Page 116 6 “Our craft is beautiful . . .”......Page 143 7 Craft as Community, Chocolate as Spectacle......Page 162 8 From Craft to Profession?......Page 198 9 Defending the Local......Page 232 10 Chocolate as Self and Other......Page 252 Epilogue......Page 276 Appendix: Fieldwork Sample......Page 284 Notes......Page 288 References......Page 304 A......Page 318 C......Page 319 D......Page 321 F......Page 322 I......Page 323 M......Page 324 P......Page 325 S......Page 326 W......Page 327 Y......Page 328 The idea for this book began naturally enough from a stop at a Parisian chocolaterie.