Rachel Swed
Reflection 1
Introduction: Food in Multi-Ethnic Literatures by: Fred L. Gardaphé and Wenying Xu
(Written in Winter, 2007)
The Relationship Between Food and Culture
In the article, “Introduction: Food in Multi-Ethnic Literature,” Fred L. Gardaphé and Wenying Xu write about the relationships between food, ethnic literatures, and cultures. They also centralize the multiple meanings of food in many ethnic traditions. The authors discuss these topics by reviewing a range of scholarship on the connection between food and culture. For example, one text that was cited from the article gave great insight in how food was an indicator of ethnic inferiority and superiority. Donna Gabaccia noted America’s efforts in assimilating immigrants to American diet as “the Home Economics Section of New York’s Department of Welfare recommended that immigrants should eat the old colonial creoles: for breakfast, hominy grits with milk and sugar, bread with butter, and milk and coffee” (9). This particular article also integrates ideas about how in the past, people from different cultures or places would not eat or even touch the food of another country. They would refer to it as “poison” and even throw out perfectly edible food. However, as the authors stated, “food [is] a cultural sign that participates in the representations of race, ethnicity, gender, class, nationality, and exile” (10). Food plays a significant role in shaping individual identities because it’s able to shape one’s cultural background and personal beliefs. It retains an immense amount of ethnic history and roots and serves as an important reminder of tradition and identity formation.
This article fits in to the overarching theme of this class: What is a multicultural city? A multicultural city can be seen in this city because we have an opportunity to experience many different types of culture, history, or national identity through different foods. Food ties in to this concept perfectly because when observing the different practices of food across multiple cultures, it kindles themes and messages different from other cultures. The authors did a compelling job at showing proof to their claim that food and culture are related by citing many articles that agree to this claim. However, they do not explain if they agree or disagree with the claim or their argument on if there is actually a connection between the two or not.
Questions:
- What are the authors’ opinions on the connection between food and culture?
- How did people go from not touching other countries and cultures food to integrating it into their diet and what they eat today?
- Why does American food have a different connotation than “ethnic food.”
