Intercultural Communication, Cultural Code-Switching, Gender and Food

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present a part of an ongoing research into the roles food plays in the present-day communication. It provides an interdisciplinary insight into those aspects of intercultural communication that occupy significant role in the changing relationship between public and private spheres. These spheres represent spaces where the aspects of gender become more visible if combined with the elements of food. The author tries to argue that women and food act as ones of the most intriguing features in the ‘Circuit of Culture’ and their participation in intercultural communication is very complex and worth more detailed investigation. The concept of code-switching is often viewed as the one applied in the situations where multilingual communication takes place. The discussion in this paper focuses on those cultural communication contexts in which the cultural code-switching is used as a response to various gender facets in both public and private spheres. Food, that has become one of the most visible parts of both public and private domains of the human existence in the 21st century enters all aspects of the intercultural communication that is performed in smaller and larger social groups and its existence, production, distribution, consumption and representation are directly linked with gender perspectives.