Craft Beer for Change with J. Nikol Jackson-Beckham
by Jennifer Breckner
Dr. J. Jackson-Beckham – Dr. J – is a professor of communications studies who has dedicated her career to the study of American beer. She was most recently appointed the first ever Diversity Ambassador for the Brewers Association and is a consultant who will appear on the Slow Food Nations panel “Craft Beer for Change” alongside Katie Wallace of New Belgium and Adam Dulye of the Brewers Association. Slow Food Nations teamed up with Jennifer Breckner to discover more about Dr. J’s experiences, passions, and ideas in the following interview.
Jennifer Breckner (JB): You are a featured participant at Slow Food Nations on the panel “Craft Beer for Change,” and are hosting a pre-festival craft beer experience. Is this the first time that you are engaging with Slow Food?
Nikol Jackson-Beckham (Dr. J.): No, in 2014 I wrote an essay called “Sustainable Brewing, Alternative Food Networks, and the Politics of Valuation” published in Food and Everyday Life that looked at how craft breweries were champions of the local and aligned themselves with discourses of sustainability including those of the slow food movement. In the five years since I wrote that essay American craft beer is inhabiting the local in new and exciting ways, especially with the emergence of sour and wild beers produced in coolships [fermentation vessels that collect local yeasts and give the beer a sense of terroir].
JB: In 2017 Slow Food USA formed the Equity, Inclusion and Justice group to address the fact that while our motto is “good, clean and fair food for all” we had more work to do in the arena of “fair.” As Diversity Ambassador for the Brewers Association, it seems that craft beer is also concerned with this work. In listening to the industry, what are they saying?
Dr. J.: They’ve said that they are in a really similar place to Slow Food when it comes to these challenges. Largely people are heartbroken because their intentions are good but haven’t actually been realized in their business. The project of equity, inclusion and justice tends to overwhelm people with a sense of fear of doing it wrong. So my approach is to come at this as a huge opportunity for a business both in terms of social good and the bottom line. To do this, a business has to think about it on par with all other organizational goals, build infrastructure and then talk through specific tactical scenarios that people can grab on too.
JB: Furthering this discussion of fair, as a speaker you have a pricing structure that you present for your services. Often in “professions of passion,” such as craft beer, the subject of compensation is taboo. Do you think it is important to talk about money? If so, why?
Dr. J.: A huge hurdle for EIJ work in these fields is that we fail to realize that what we do is labor so it doesn’t occur to many that this work should be compensated. We need to change the narrative. For me personally, I have had to be deliberate and specific of how I use my time and to separate out what is “working” and what is “serving” and how that is valued.
JB: “Craft Beer for Change” presents the industry as one where real change occurs in a unique way. Why do you think that is so?
Dr. J.: Personally, as someone who home-brews, gardens and has chickens, there is something about putting your hands on things that opens up your mind. The phrase that I go back to the most in craft beer is “embrace the pause,” which I think of as the moment to stretch your mind a little bit before you have a knee jerk response that sets you down the road of the status quo. Sitting with strangers at a brewpub I am able to occupy the pause and have made more unlikely relationships there than anywhere else in my life. Maybe it has to do with the conviviality of the industry and the types of labor it takes to produce craft beer, but I find people there who embrace the pause giving opportunity for new conversations and actions to happen.
Join us at “Craft Beer for Change” by purchasing tickets here.
