Culinary Nationalism in Asia

Description

This collection of essays comprises a groundbreaking volume, as it is the first to propose a critical, comparative framework for the study of modern foodways both inside and outside of Asia, through the crucial lens of culinary nationalism. With “culinary nationalism” defined as a process in flux, diametrically opposed to the limited concept of national cuisine, the contributors call for explicit critical comparisons of cases of culinary nationalism within regions, in order to recognize regional patterns of modern culinary development. In essence, the formation of modern cuisine is revealed to be a process that takes place around the world, in different forms and periods, and is not exclusive to current Eurocentric models. Instead, the essays set out a fresh agenda for thinking about future food studies scholarship through the comparative consideration of key themes: gender, cooking, and consumption; the cultivation of taste and authority; the reinterpretation of culinary traditions; inter/national cuisines; hunger, violence, nation; and Asia as culinary imaginary. With fourteen original contributions from a range of established food studies scholars, including Katarzyna J. Cwiertka, Eric C. Rath, James Farrer, Jean Duruz, and Daniel E. Bender, and a foreword and afterword from Krishnendu Ray and James L. Watson, respectively, this volume is a vital contribution to the study of food in Asia. The interdisciplinary, and broadly comparative, scope of the chapters ranges across historical and contemporary culinary geographies of East, South and Southeast Asia, drawing from history, sociology, anthropology, geography, economics, literary studies, and film and cultural studies. Cover Half title Series Title Copyright Contents List of Figures List of Maps Foreword: Food in the Making and Unmaking of Asian Nationalisms Acknowledgments Maps Introduction: Culinary Nationalism in Asia Part One Historical Legacies 1 “Vegetarian” Nationalism: Critiques of Meat Eating for Japanese Bodies, 1880–1938 2 Food, Gender, and Domesticity in Nationalist North India: Between Digestion and Desire 3 A Cookbook in Search of a Country: Fu Pei-meiand the Conundrum of Chinese Culinary Nationalism 4 From Military Rations to UNESCO Heritage: A Short History of Korean Kimchi Part Two Internal Boundaries 5 Priestess of Sake: Woman as Producer in Natsuko’s Sake 6 Defining “Modern Malaysian” Cuisine: Fusion or Ingredients? 7 Eating to Live: Sustaining the Body and Feeding the Spirit in the Films of Tsai Ming-liang 8 The Politicization of Beef and Meat in Contemporary India: Protecting Animals and Alienating Minorities Part Three Global Contexts 9 Writing an “International” Cuisine in Japan: Murai Gensai’s 1903 Culinary Novel Kuidōraku 10 Red (Michelin) Stars Over China: Seeking Recognition in a Transnational Culinary Field 11 Drinking Scorpions at Trader Vic’s: Polynesian Parties, Caribbean Rum, Chinese Cooks, and American Tourists 12 Laksa Nation: Tastes of “Asian” Belonging, Borrowed and Reimagined Afterword: Feasting and the Pursuit of National Unity—American Thanksgiving and Cantonese Common-Pot Dining Notes on Contributors Index