Dr. Perry Share

The crack is...

I said earlier on, you know, the attraction of the Irish pub was sort of hard to define.

So is crack.

I mean, it is a word that came actually from English into Irish or into Ireland.

But it refers to, I suppose, an indefinable sense of camaraderie and conviviality that you get in a pub when an evening goes well and maybe, you know, text messages are sent or, you know, people move around.

They find the right pub, the right people, maybe some music starts playing or you meet a group of people.

The noise level might go up.

The bar staff are keeping things going.

And at the end of the evening, everyone says, of course, that was great crack in the pub tonight.

But nobody can really put a finger on what it was.

You just know it when you see it.

And of course, we try to market that to tourists.

Yeah, I mean, there are other places like public libraries, playgrounds, maybe nail bars, coffee shops now that compete for that, but...

The really important thing about a third place, which was coined by an American sociologist called Ray Oldenburg, is that it's a place where anyone can come into and they don't really have any obligations when they go in.

So in theory, you can go into a pub and you can have a cup of tea or a glass of water, sit down, look at your phone, read the paper, maybe chat to the people beside you, maybe not.

And then leave when you want to leave.

And you're not obliged to do anything.

Unlike in a coffee shop, for example, or a library, maybe there's expectations there.

So he said it's a very valuable part of actually public life and also democratic society that you get to meet people that you wouldn't meet otherwise.

And so many of us now are in bubbles, you know, through social media, perhaps.