Professor Phil Withington and Dr Nick Groat reflect on the last 60 years in the history of alcohol. They discuss technical innovation, life-style choices, ‘healthy’ drinking and the Craft Alcohol Movement and wonder whether we're living through a new moment when alcohol changed the world.

Guests:

Cynthia King and her husband John Cherry run Locksley Distilling, a small-batch distillery in Sheffield. Among many initiatives, they’ve created a Co-Lab range of spirits, working in collaboration with select businesses and organisations such as historic properties and top restaurants. They’ve recently launched two new Co-Labs Chocolate Chilli Rum and Bloody Mary Vodka

Pete Brown is an author, journalist and broadcaster specialising in food and drink. He’s the Sunday Times Magazine’s weekly beer columnist and has published numerous books including:

• Clubland: How the Working Men’s Club Shaped Britain
• Craft – An Argument: Why the term Craft Beer is completely undefinable, hopelessly misunderstood and absolutely essential

Prof Stephen Charters is Professor of Wine Marketing and a researcher at Burgundy School of Business in Dijon. He is responsible for developing teaching and research programmes focusing on all aspects of the culture, history and business of wine. His research interests are in consumer behaviour, wine and place (including terroir, wine tourism, and territorial wine management) and cultures of consumption and production. He is currently involved in a project aiming to deepen our understanding of the Pinot Noir grape worldwide.

Prof Alex Mold is Professor of Public Health History and Co-Head of the Doctoral College at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Her research interests include the changing nature of public health over the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, the history of substance abuse, especially illegal drugs and alcohol, and health education messaging around alcohol.

Her publications include:

• Alcohol, health education and changing notions of risk in Britain, 1980-1990

Full transcript available here.