Dr. Ronda Brulotte, UNM
May 8, 2016

Dr. Ronda Brulotte will discuss the sociologically complex field of production, marketing, consumption, and connoisseurship surrounding Oaxacan mezcal as it emerges in the global market. Not only is mezcal Oaxaca’s fastest-growing rural industry, it connects the region to an emergent network of producers, brokers, and consumers across the U.S.-Mexico border and beyond. Mezcal may be joining more well-known foods of Mexican origin commonplace in U.S. markets (corn, chile, chocolate), but its circulation as a food/beverage commodity is distinctly tied to the creation of a new class of global food consumers; at the same time, its growing popularity is spurring the social and economic reorganization of producer communities.

Dr. Ronda Brulotte is Associate Professor of Anthropology and an affiliated faculty member of the Latin American and Iberian Institute at the University of New Mexico. She earned a Ph.D. in Anthropology (2006) and M.A. in Latin American Studies (1999) at the University of Texas at Austin. Her teaching, research, and scholarship focus on tourism, material culture, critical heritage studies, and the anthropology of food. She has conducted ethnographic fieldwork in Oaxaca, Mexico since 1998 and is currently writing a book about mezcal production in the region.

Supported by Sandia National Labs and Haverland Carter Lifestyle Group