Hot Java

[Judy Panetta]

Judy Panetta schrieb:
> Coffee! Gallons of coffee. Any thoughts on the presence of coffee?
> A social contrivance? A historical tidbit worth working?

Kai wrote:
> to connect the rise of coffee in the west to 'reasonable political
> debate', newspapers, and the bourgeois revolutions has become
> a standard exercise of social history. for an early formulation with
> a philosophical background see the only good book by habermas,
> "the structural change of the public sphere",
> § 5-8, from the early 1960s. personally, i drink my coffee really strong,
> yet sandwiched with lots of milk.

And I like my coffee like my m...ah...never mind. On first reading I took
this to be a Pynchonian nod to the "Starbucks phenomena" of the early-mid
90's (?) ...a coffee bar on every corner all offering "politically correct"
beans.

But...coffee as a symbol of colonial exploitation? ...in colonial America.
Hmmmm. Otto has more below...

> kai frederik file://:: ps: a footnote on drug wars - when coffee came up,
> there were some european territories where coffee drinking was
> punished with death.

Yikes!

Otto:
> Of course you can only drink coffee reasonable with sugar and milk . . .

> 1. Coffee as a plant of colonial exploitation (Nederlands-Indie aka
> Indonesia) with all the negative effects on the "Colonized" who had to be
> enlightened, as elsewhere.

> "Ik ben makelaar in koffi (...). Het is mijn gewoonte niet, romans to
> schryven, of zulke dingen (...)"
> "I am coffee-dealer (...). Novel-writing or something like that isn't my
> habit."
> Multatuli: "Max Havelaar" (1860), opening sentence.
> (own trans, I would be greatful for the official English version)

> 2. Coffee-houses as social places -- very suspect to the authorities in
the
> 18th and 19th century.

> 3. Indeed Pynchon reminds us here in the first chapter already that social
> norms and values whether a substance is regarded as dangerous or socially
> accepted may change:

> "Keep away from harmful Substances, in particular Coffee, Tobacco and
Indian
> Hemp. If you must use the latter, do not inhale." (10)

> Note that "Alcohol" isn't mentioned, more dangerous & more widespread than
> the other three.

Keep that Madeira flowing, I always say. And don't ya jus' love the Clinton
reference there?