Stereotypes tend to irritate me. In that, I suppose that I am like most people. As part of my job (special education teacher, middle school, visually impaired & learning disabled), I try to teach the kids to check themselves when they start thinking about folks in terms of stereotypes. I also try to teach them to make sure they are not being stereotyped by others and how to stand up for themselves when that happens.

There are countless stereotypes out there, but since this is a beer column, I am going to talk about the stereotype about people who drink beer. To wit, the stereotype is probably best embodied by something like this:

As someone who very much enjoys beer, I cringe at things like this (because really, that pig should NOT be drinking!). Seriously though, I wince when I read or hear folks going on about how “trashed” they got or how “wasted” they were. I’m not gonna lie—I did the same thing when I was in college, law school & a few years after. But when I began drinking craft beer, I learned that craft beer drinkers are some of the coolest, smartest and funnest (go with me, it fits) people out there. I also learned that there is a whole vocabulary unique to the hobbies of brewing and drinking.

I know that discussing terms of art specific to fine beer will not necessarily combat any stereotypes, but I hope that it will shed some light onto the folks who brew and enjoy craft and specialty beer. Further, this list is not exclusive—I just picked ten terms at random—but I hope it will explain some of the words that we beer folks often toss around like it is Spring Training and we’re in Lakeland.

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So looking beyond the stereotypes, there is to be found a thriving culture of folks who don’t stumble around dropping things, don’t disappear into Lost Weekends and don’t hang onto the floor after a night out. Those stereotypical drinkers do exist, but there are as many different personalities in the beer “culture” as there are individual drinkers. Now there is also a stereotype that “girls” don’t drink beer…but that’s another article!