Boak and Bailey's Beer Blog - Words as blunt tools

Visit the Boak and Bailey's Beer Blog site

http://boakandbailey.com/wp-content/.../craftbeer.gif
Last night, another conversation about the language we use to discuss beer kicked off when Lovibonds brewer Jeff Rosenmeier said this on Twitter:
http://boakandbailey.com/wp-content/.../lovibonds.gif
Our two penn’orth was in the form of a quick diagram (above, top) which shows how we think it works in the UK, i.e. with ‘craft beer’ as a super-category which includes most real ale, some kegged beer and (not included in the pic) some bottled beer.
The fact is, though, that none of the terms we use are perfect; they’re just blunt tools to enable conversation.
We’re both reminded of meetings we used to endure in previous jobs. Typically, six hours would be set aside to solve a problem, of which five would be spent going round the table arguing about thelanguage: “What exactly does ‘world class’ mean? I don’t like it.”
The last hour would be spent discussing how there was no longer enoug time to solve the problem and agreeing dates for another six hour meeting.



More...