SOC 155 Coffeehouses and Public Life
The coffeehouse has long been a storied place for creating public life, from convivial social groups to intellectual salons to revolutionary cells. We will study the coffeehouse as a “third place” – not home, not work – where people from different social groups can meet and mix. Caffeine, especially in coffee, tea, and chocolate, has fueled a modern public sphere that promotes hard work and clear thinking. We will make several field trips to different kinds of coffeehouses. We will make ethnographic films to show how the coffeehouse can be an incubator of public life.