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Michael Ferguson sometimes jokingly refers to himself among colleagues as "the other black brewer."

That's because Ferguson, of the BJ's Restaurants group, is one of only a small handful of African-Americans who make beer for a living. Latinos and Asian Americans are scarce within the brewing community, too.

"For the most part, you've got a bunch of white guys with beards making beer," says Yiga Miyashiro, a Japanese-American brewer with Saint Archer Brewery in San Diego.

Sure, there are prominent exceptions — like Garrett Oliver, the brewmaster at Brooklyn Brewery, and Celeste and Khouri Beatty, the owners and operators of Harlem Brewing Company. There are a few others, too — but that's out of more than 2,600 breweries nationwide.

So how did American craft brewing end up so lacking in diversity?

It's a puzzle, agrees Wall Street Journal beer reviewer and author William Bostwick, who is now working on a global history of beer to be titled "The Brewer's Tale." He says that virtually every culture in the world's human history has made alcoholic beverages.

"It's one of the few things that all cultures share, so why it's now dominated here in the U.S., and maybe in Europe and Australia, by white males is something I can't explain," Bostwick says.

Frederick Douglas Opie, a food historian at Babson College, says that cultures in western and central Africa have "a long history of artisan brewing." People of the region, he says, made beer from sorghum and millet, as well as palm wine – which, he says, was considered by some a luxury product.

"So, why that discontinues in America after the Atlantic slave trade, I don't know," Opie says. Blacks, he notes, often made moonshine liquor and bootleg beer in the 1920s and '30s. But these days, they're all but absent from the craft beer scene. "It could be that beer is like a lot of things in the food industry which, as they grow popular, become very hip, yuppie and white."

Looking at the nation's community of homebrewers also sheds light on the matter, says brewer Jeremy Marshall, of Lagunitas Brewing Company.

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"I've always felt hip-hop as a culture hasn't really yet embraced its international roots." That's something that Blitz the Ambassador is working to change. Born Samuel Bazawule in Ghana, he grew up listening to Public Enemy. Now, he's a rapper in the U.S. His sound blends his rap influences like Chuck D with the Afrobeat sounds of Fela Kuti and the high-life music of his home.

All these influences helped to create his identity. "The more I traveled, the more I realized that there's a specific role that I need to be playing, and that role is about bridging gaps and expanding the culture that I've been so blessed enough to be a part of," he tells NPR's Michel Martin. "That's why I went with the Ambassador."

Blitz's Afropolitan Dreams will be out early next year. It's a continuation of his musical journey documenting the African immigrant experience in America. He's just released an EP The Warm Up as a taste of what's to come.

A song like "African in New York" is "really just an assertion that we're here. There are Africans in New York." Blitz says he has always wanted someone to write a song about their experience, "selling bootlegs, or graduating from medical school, or driving cabs. It's all these things that are part of our life and our culture as immigrants that need to be celebrated."

The Syria conflict was initially part of a wave of uprisings in 2011 known as the Arab Spring, which began in part as a cry for political freedom and more economic opportunity. Fast-forward to today, when unemployment in some of these countries is among the highest in the world.

The Burger King doesn't stay king by resting on his laurels. No, he stays king by constantly innovating (and by executing dissenters). New on the menu is the French Fry Burger, which is, you may have guessed, a burger topped with french fries. It costs $1, which should be considered a value and a red flag.

Peter: Since they're exactly $1 each, they can legally be used as currency.

Ian: And you can use actual dollars as napkins!

Mike: Dollar Menu is fast-food shorthand for "Day Old."

Miles: And "exciting new burger concept" is shorthand for "RUN! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!"

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