Sharing Yerba Mate

<p>Drinking yerba mate is a daily communal ritual that has brought together South Americans for some five centuries. In lively prose and with vivid illustrations Rebekah E. Pite explores how this Indigenous infusion made from the naturally caffeinated leaves of a local holly tree became one of the most distinctive and widely consumed beverages in the region. Latin American food and commodity studies have focused on consumption in the global north but Pite tells the story of yerba mate in South America illuminating dynamic and exploitative circuits of production promotion and consumption. Ideas about who should harvest and serve yerba mate along with visions of the archetypical mate drinker persisted and were transformed alongside the shifting politics of class race and gender.<br/><br/>This global history takes us from the colonial Río de la Plata to the top yerba-consuming and producing nations of Argentina Brazil Paraguay and Uruguay with excursions to Chile the Middle East Europe and the United States where yerba mate is now sold as a “superfood.” For readers eager to understand South America and its unique drink <i>Sharing Yerba Mate</i> is an essential text that delves into an everyday ritual to expose systems of power and the taste of belonging.</p>