Cachaça de alambique: desvelando as práticas de consumo em confrarias sob a ótica das ontologias do lugar

Abstract

This doctoral study is the result of an intellectual effort with the intention of understanding the practices and consumer relations of artisanal cachaça. The central objective of this investigation was based on answering the following questions: How do confreres experience the practices of consumption of artisanal cachaças? How do the imbrications between material and symbolic aspects are manifested in these consumption practices? For this purpose, the following specific objectives were proposed: i) to reconstitute the history of the confraternities studied as spaces, structuring the practices of consumption of alembic cachaça and emphasizing its teleoaffective structures; ii) to investigate the consumers' understanding of the consumption practices of artisanal cachaça, particularizing the meanings attributed by the consuming confreres to the social, symbolic and material dimension inherent to these practices; iii) to demonstrate the social norms and norms that mark (restrict or stimulate) the practices of consumption of cachaça, including rituals of conscious consumption; and iv) to analyze, comparatively, the artisanal cachaça consumption practices, taking into account their specificities in terms of teleoaffective structures, rules, senses of consumption and sociomaterial arrangement. Site Ontologies from the studies of Thedore Schatzki, Consumption Studies in an anthropological and cultural perspective, as well as the contextualization of the Cachaça Market from the perceptions of the National Association of Producers of Cachaça of Quality – ANPAQ were proposed to meet the objectives of the study. Regarding the methodology, it is clarified that the philosophical orientation of the work approaches Social Realism, qualitative nature, descriptive exploratory typology. The data collection techniques were summarized in the in-depth interviews, construction of the field diary and participant observation. Fieldwork was developed between November 2017 and May 2019, with two confraternities dedicated to the consumption of artisanal cachaça. Thirty-two interviews were collected, of which 30 were transcribed and later analyzed in the light of Content Analysis and Narrative Analysis. The results of the research pointed out points of similarity and distinction between the analyzed groups regarding the understandings, norms, teleoaffective structures and material arrangements that composed the consumption practices of the participants of the research. The final reflections of the work indicated the scientific contributions of the ontological, epistemological, theoretical and methodological approaches proposed by this research. Moreover, the main social contributions regarding the deconstruction of the negative stigma around the distillate consumer were also highlighted. The main limitations of the research were detailed and an agenda for further investigations was proposed.