Terroir more

Terroir1 Terroir is a French word, derived from the latin ‘territorium’, meaning territory. It long retained its original meaning of ‘territory’ (ground, country, region) but developed a more specialized connotation as ‘location’ or ‘soil’, considered in terms of its ability to support specific types of agricultural production. It is strongly associated with regional foods such as tea or coffee and viniculture in particular. Reference to wine is redolent in the use of the term, as in the following evocative expressions: ‘goût du terroir’ (tasting of terroir) or ‘sentir le terroir’ (smelling of terroir). More recently, the word has been used as a synonym of ‘origin’ to evoke a ‘sense of place’ and combine implicit reference to distinctive attributes of locality and terrain. It denotes a rural region considered as shaping the distinctive characteristics of its inhabitants, language or local culture, including the local accent (accent du terroir). This usage associates social and cultural practice and place with connotations of roots and origin, tradition and heritage. Conceptual overview and Discussion Widely used in viniculture (winemaking) and viticulture (grape cultivation), terroir refers to the distinctive elements of a region that render its wines unique, distinctive and typical of a place. In the winemaking context, terroir results from a combination of ecological, geological, historical and human factors. Strict agronomic definitions of terroir exclusively refer to the natural elements which contribute to shape the ecology of wine (innate or matter terroir), including climate and geology (topography, soil and subsoil type). The interactions between climate and vineyard can happen at different levels: macroclimate of a wine region, mesoclimate of a subsection of a region (or of an appellation, see below) and individual microclimate of a particular vineyard or row of grapevine. Topography (the features of the natural landscape features: mountains, hills, valleys) interacts with climate, affecting the altitude and sun exposure as well as the soil geology of vineyards locations. ‘Elements of soil’ refers to the chemical composition (nutrients and minerals) as well as physical characteristics (heat retention or water drainage properties) which influence soil fertility and the nutrition and growth of vine plants. Innate or matter terroir combines the material and chemical characteristics of the physical environment in which the grapes are grown. The expression ‘terroir effect’ refers to the intimate relationship between soil and subsoil, grape and winegrowing and winemaking savoir-faire and practices which can influence the expression of the material characteristics of terroir in wine (choice of grape varieties, pruning, irrigation, selection of the time of harvest, conditions of fermentation). Sometimes literarily referred as ‘a taste of the soil’ on a material level, "terroir effect" shows how minor variations in the material environment can produce rich and complex variations in production. Location, slope, humidity, soil acidity, the interactions of biological agents at the molecular level, changes in timing and length Earlier draft of an entry published in: A.J. Mills, G. Durepos and E. Wiebe ed(s). Encyclopedia of Case Study Research. London: Sage, 2009, 921-23. 1 of sun exposure, the presence of scents in the atmosphere or boulders in the soil, can together profoundly affect the taste of the wine in the glass as the product of an extremely complex and adaptive natural system. There is, however, no conclusive proof of the material effects of the chemical composition of the soil, for example, so the importance of terroir remains a subject of debate and even controversy. Historically the concept has been extended considerably from its use in viniculture. ‘Space terroir’ refers to political and cultural aspects of locality and regions, place, land and territory. For instance, the notion of regional cuisine (or specialities) emerged in France after the 1789 Revolution with the administrative delimitation of local diversities, partly as a political expression of cultural differences: local v. national or rural v. urban. Cultural practices in local and rural spaces have subsequently been historically constructed in terms of heritage, tradition or ‘knowledge of the past’ by intellectual elites in the context of recognising regionalist feelings or promoting local traditions as a tool for achieving sustainable rural development. By extension, reference to terroir is now widely used commercially to market brand identity for gourmet foodstuffs (wine, cheese, oil, meat products, nuts, vegetables or regional culinary specialties), connoting tradition, locality, distinctiveness, or quality more generally. The concept of terroir is ‘fundamental to the wine industries of Old World countries including France, Spain, Italy or Germany. The French legal definition of local origine: Appellation d’Origine Controllee (AOC), the oldest and strictest of the European label of origin system was established in 1935 to translate terroir. This system authenticates origin rather than grape variety in quality winemaking with the purpose of guaranteeing the uniqueness of wines from an area, officially sanctioning a combination of certain vineyard sites and grape varieties to create a particular geographically distinct wine. Each appellation acts as a self-regulated system of social practices which ensures quality winemaking governance in combining local winegrowers associations (syndicates) and the National Institute of Origin Appellations (INAO, in French). It controls several aspects of winemaking including the delimitation of the growing area, grape varieties, yields and harvest period, the specification of the alcohol, sugar content or conditioning format and yearly blind tasting by a committee of producers. The appellation system clearly has a political character as well as a quality objective. It contributes to segment the French wine market by quality and regional character where wines compete on the basis of terroir rather than price and has protectionist effects. How much and even whether this interpretation of terroir should influence the marketplace is been very much debated in the wine industry. Advocates of the "New World" style of wines emphasise modern scientific techniques and the advantages of producing less complex wines geared towards customers' existing tastes and demands. If we consider this as an allegory for case study research, it is clear that the detailed micro-focus of "terroir" is equivalent to intensively "emic" methodologies, whilst the New World style, often incorporating multi-methods, is more akin to the "etic" approach, concentrating on translatability of information and the development of sophisticated tools and methodologies to achieve this most effectively. Terroir has also been understood within literature and philosophy to emphasize regionalism in authorship, usually denoting conservatism and a celebration of rural or traditional wisdom and cultural roots. However, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari offer an alternative understanding of the concept in terms of territory that is nonoriginary. Terroirs are how concepts and representations -capital, words, things- are culturally realised and acquire qualities, taste, aroma or savour. Rather than material sites of cultural origin, they are constructed outcomes of cultural processes of territorialization and deterritorialization. For instance, capital, as an abstract term, needs terroir for its realization in different material and social forms which change across time and place (money, exchange rates, property…). Being nomad, for Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, is not just about moving through landscapes, but an intimate movement within and between terroirs, being alive to changing nuance and detail – what Clifford Geertz calls local knowledge. De Certeau introduces the idea of “discursive terroir” which roughly corresponds to indexical and untranslatable elements in a discourse and is realised in his rich and evocative French, playing with words, cultural allusions and idiosyncratic expressions. Terroir can thus have significant symbolic and discursive connotations. Application Relating both to literary-philosophical usages and the Old World - New World production-consumption controversies we have described, reference to the concept of terroir can enrich case study research in two ways: materially and metaphorically. First, terroir effect (the material influences of terroir into the character of the wine) might be considered for complex human beings in social systems: what influences from the material environment might combine in unacknowledged but sophisticated ways to influence behaviours? This aspect of case study research, which demands a much deeper consideration of the effects of the material environment, is still largely unacknowledged with the exception of some branches of cultural anthropology (including anthropology of food) and actor-network theory. Second, the micro-focus of terroir opens up distinctive and more detailed considerations of the symbolic complexity of human beings for ethnography in particular. Complementing ethnomethodology which has adopted an ultra-micro focus to emphasise technical issues at the expense of the evocation of meaning, the metaphor of terroir would insist on the inseparable connectivity between the two. The work of Michel De Certeau noted above offers a good example of this in urban ethnography. Terroir as metaphor offers a way of combining the micro-material and the micro-symbolic within a conceptualisation of a dynamic and interconnected whole. - Garance Marechal See also: Ethnomethodology, Actor-network theory, Emic/etic, Thick description Further reading and references: Allhoff, F. and Monroe, D. (eds). 2007. Food and Philosophy. Eat, Think and Be Merry. Oxford: Blackwell. Barham, E. 2003. Translating Terroir: The Global Challenge of French AOC Labeling. Journal of Rural Studies, 19/1, 127–138 Colman, T. 2008. Wine Politics: How Governments, Environmentalists, Mobsters, and Critics Influence the Wines We Drink. Bekerley: University of California Press. Geertz, C. 1983. Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York, NY: Basic Books Van Leeuwen, C, and Seguin, G. 2006. The concept of terroir in viticulture. Journal of Wine Research, 17/1:1 – 10. Tomasik, T.J. 2002. Certeau a la Carte : Translating Discursive Terroir in The Practice of Everyday Life : Living and Cooking. The South Atlantic Quarterly, 100/2: 519-542.