What is the Connection Between Immigrant Identity & Traditional Cuisine OR, Why Does Identity Matter in a Discussion of Improving the Food System?

I believe that it is impossible to fully address the issues in our modern food system without also addressing issues of socio-cultural identity. If the aim is to craft a future in which the food system, at each node, both produces and benefits, we must acknowledge the importance of the actors present—namely, people. The leviathan that produces and procures food in the United States, despite its seeming inevitability and automation, is still entirely dependent on living, breathing bodies. This applies from every possible lens through which we analyze the situation. The reason for the food system’s existence at all, of course, is to provide sustenance for the population. In that sense, it is dependent on the bodies which consume its products. The maintenance and continuation of the system, from a production standpoint, is also dependent on bodies; from the farmworkers in the fields to the owners of the farms, from the drivers of the freight trucks to the stockers of grocery shelves, and all the incalculable niches along the way.

              Every single one of those bodies has an independent mind, and the distinctly human strong will to identify. Of the millions of agricultural workers in the United States today, an estimated 71% percent of them are immigrants—meaning that a huge majority of the workers toiling in the fields, providing food for American tables, are carrying with them strong identities, rooted in the traditions of another country. Though this is a huge demographic, with numerous urgent problems that need address, agriculture is only one facet of a sprawling industrial food system that depends on the bodies of immigrants.

              Because the food system is so massive, operating on numerous levels that intersect in many different ways and at different loci, an effort to construct a “model food future” must be equally comprehensive. Considering the fact that at every point throughout the food system there are agents operating within different matrices of cultural identity, it would seem that glossing over identity as a major aspect of a constructive overhaul leaves an alarming gap in what needs to be a concerted effort.

              The basic notion here is that in many ways, identity and food are inseparable. Our daily human existence depends on food, and thus it follows that the ways in which we procure, produce, and consume it shape the way we approach the world around us. This has both positive and negative impacts on social interaction. Taking a historical perspective, because we are social animals that rely on eating, the interconnection between food and identity presumably dates back to the advent of higher self-awareness itself, and has played out repeatedly since in ways that serve to separate distinct groups, and reinforce conceptions of inherent social stratification. Cultural identity now most often refers to nationality, though that is a relatively recent development. Prior to the 18th and 19th centuries, identity was modeled on observable difference—most apparent in physiology, and quotidian habits such as particular foodways. For instance, Steven Shapin notes that, from the perspective of the Spanish imperialists in Latin America, “the right foods—those to which the colonists were accustomed, notably wheat bread and wine—would, it was thought, protect the colonial body from the physiological risks of the New World environment, while eating local foodstuffs would transform it into the flawed native body.” (384)

              In the modern age, food production and consumption has become increasingly expressed through the realms of big business and the state, which Shapin points out gives new meaning to the phrase “you are what you eat.” Not only does the material substance of the food affect our constitutions, but the new “state of affairs opens up a new idiom in which food choices can count as moral and political comment.” (Shapin, 392) In other words, the addition of modern notions of identity such as nationhood and capitalist socio-economic standing have only reinforced the connection between conception of self and the food that one consumes.

              These new aspects of cultural identity have come with an increasing need for maintenance of tradition. Globalization, since its relatively recent inception in the early 16th century, has snowballed from a novel approach to trade to a way of life so pervasive that it will soon be forgotten that there was ever any alternative. As geographic mobility increases, the spaces between cultures and tradition shrink, and their norms are enacted not simply by being in a particular place, but by willful conscious action.

              For most of human history, cultural norms were just that: normal. For the most part, one did not choose what or how to eat, what language to speak, or where they wanted to settle down. Manners of everyday life were dictated by where one was born, and to what socio-economic station. However, as globalization has taken its hold by means forceful and otherwise, individuals are now able to see outside of their cultures; as easily as turning on a tuning in to the radio, switching on a television, or glancing at a pocket-sized screen. With such an overwhelming glut of information and foreign cultural influence, it no longer requires being an immigrant to feel significant assault on one’s traditional values.

One study on the food preferences of the populace of Aragón, a Spanish province, highlights the fact that strong preferences for local, traditional food lie mostly within the aged demographic living in small towns. The authors of the study go on to conclude that more than material factors, “choice is determined by the meaning conveyed by food (cultural belonging, social prestige, health, etc.)” (Cantarero, 889) In other words, the portion of the population who, from the relative isolation of old age and rural living, bear witness to the seas of strange social transitions swirling around them, feel the strongest urge to enact and reify their traditional values through their eating habits.

This urge can be seen in identity formation within immigrant populations as well. The isolation of age and geography discussed above can be reflected in the nature of transnational living. Even in an urban setting, boundaries are drawn that effectively isolate communities of predominantly different identities. Versions of Chinatown, Little Italy, Koreatown, and Little Manila can be found in cities across the United States. In places with high concentrations of transnationals such as these, the typical food system becomes transfigured to reflect that particular identity. Such boundaries and acknowledged differences serve to easily create an insider/outsider dichotomy that can be detrimental to concerted efforts to contribute to progressive food movements.