Beyond Bia Hơi ? Distinction and Aspiration in Hanoi's Craft Beer Scene

In this article we examine the emergence of Hanoi's craft beer scene as a window into shifting class identities, aspirational consumption, and local–global negotiations in contemporary Vietnam. We bring together Bourdieu's theorisation of taste as symbolic capital with Appadurai's concept of aspiration to analyse how consumption practices become bound up with distinction and imagined futures. Methodologically, we draw on 67 semi‐structured interviews with craft beer consumers, as well as key informant interviews with industrial actors. We analyse how craft beer functions not only as a beverage but as a marker of taste that can signal cosmopolitan belonging and middle class distinction, and show how craft beer consumption reflects both enduring cultural attachments and future‐oriented lifestyles. Nonetheless, we also find that while many craft beer drinkers embrace its creativity and global appeal, some also remain deeply attached to bia hơi, Vietnam's iconic unpasteurised draft beer, citing affordability, familiarity, and cultural resonance. We argue that the rise of craft beer in Hanoi is not simply a diffusion of global trends, but a locally mediated practice where class dynamics, nationalism, memory, and experimentation intersect.