Renovating ethnic identity on<i>Restaurant Makeover</i>

Brayton, Sean; Millington, Brad

doi:10.1080/13504630.2011.558372

“…Racism, according to Stuart Hall (Hall & du Gay, 1996), "operates by constructing impassable boundaries between racially constructed categories, and its typically binary systems of representation constantly masks and attempts to fix and naturalize the difference between belongingness and otherness" (p. 446). This very principle is illustrated by Brayton and Millington's (2011) discussion about the hospitality industry's past practice of actively lobbying for white-only hiring practices for front-of-the house staff, up until 1938.…”

Section: So What Does This Mean For Canadian Cuisine?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Seeing the connection does not require a great mental leap. It does, however, require thinking about food as something beyond sustenance and requires further probing about the implications to eating foods made by non-dominant cultures (Abarca 2004;Chez, 2011;Brayton & Millington, 2011). Eating in restaurants that serve international cuisine can be used as an opportunity to educate, explore and find commonality (Ashley et al, 2004).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eating identity: challenging narratives of Canadianness through culinary identity building

Ramtahal¹

2021

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This MRP will examine how food can be used as a tool for challenging traditional nation stories and growing notions of what it means to be Canadian. There is an opportunity to write and shape a Canadian narrative that is inclusive of its evolving demography while simultaneously reconciling its violent history by developing a Canadian culinary identity. Food is political, social and cultural. Food can bring people together and can provide a platform to have compelling discussions about what it means to be Canadian; who is included in the definition of Canadian; and, how we can develop a sense of Canadianness that speaks to an evolving population. Historically and at present, Canada’s story has often excluded or minimized the cultural, political and social contributions of Indigenous peoples and racialized immigrants. There remains a prevailing sense of Canadian identity being tethered to whiteness despite over a century of global immigration. However, the very idea of what defines Canadianness is relatively tenuous one. There are few traits, markers, or qualities that are seen as characteristically Canadian. This is even more true for Canada’s culinary identity. What exactly is Canadian food? Canada, as a nation, is a relatively new country without a clear culinary identity. Further, Canada is an expansive land mass covering different time zones, geographic regions, and climates. To further complicate matters, it is place for people from all over the world to immigrate. Nowhere is the impact of immigration and the diversity of people more evident than in Toronto. How the city has changed demographically is reflected in the diversification of it’s culinary landscape. The wide range of available foods reveals and affirms how the appetites and desires of those that live here have also changed. International foods, restaurants and markets are not only ubiquitous, but a defining characteristic of the city. Where, what and how people eat can provide insight into how historical systems of inequality and colonial narratives persist. Growing and developing Canadian culinary identity is a way of challenging the idea of whiteness as a prerequisite for being Canadian. It is a potential way to acknowledge and include immigrant contributions. Food is wrapped up in politics of inequality and injustice, just as much as it is in pleasure and desire. Mapping how food is used as a tool that furthers colonization and racist dogma is key for shifting food to a tool for education and understanding. Food has the power to open up conversation and reshape understandings of Canadian identity through developing and defining a distinct Canadian culinary position. If an understanding about Canadian culinary identity is inclusive of its complex and divergent cultural and political history, then perhaps there is an opportunity to rethink Canadian identity as a whole. The goal of this MRP is to establish that food can be used as an ideological intervention that examines, challenges and reimagines Canadian identity.

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“…"Multiculturalism a portmanteau term for anything from minority discourse to post-colonial critique" (Hall & du Gay, 1996, p. 55). The idealistic theory behind multiculturalism was to promote intercultural encounters, create exchange in hopes of developing a sense of national unity (Brayton & Millington, 2011). The Canadian concept of multiculturalism has changed and evolved over the course of its history and still remains highly contested.…”

Section: Multiculturalism Identity and Food As Cultural Appropriationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eating identity: challenging narratives of Canadianness through culinary identity building

Ramtahal¹

2021

Preprint

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This MRP will examine how food can be used as a tool for challenging traditional nation stories and growing notions of what it means to be Canadian. There is an opportunity to write and shape a Canadian narrative that is inclusive of its evolving demography while simultaneously reconciling its violent history by developing a Canadian culinary identity. Food is political, social and cultural. Food can bring people together and can provide a platform to have compelling discussions about what it means to be Canadian; who is included in the definition of Canadian; and, how we can develop a sense of Canadianness that speaks to an evolving population. Historically and at present, Canada’s story has often excluded or minimized the cultural, political and social contributions of Indigenous peoples and racialized immigrants. There remains a prevailing sense of Canadian identity being tethered to whiteness despite over a century of global immigration. However, the very idea of what defines Canadianness is relatively tenuous one. There are few traits, markers, or qualities that are seen as characteristically Canadian. This is even more true for Canada’s culinary identity. What exactly is Canadian food? Canada, as a nation, is a relatively new country without a clear culinary identity. Further, Canada is an expansive land mass covering different time zones, geographic regions, and climates. To further complicate matters, it is place for people from all over the world to immigrate. Nowhere is the impact of immigration and the diversity of people more evident than in Toronto. How the city has changed demographically is reflected in the diversification of it’s culinary landscape. The wide range of available foods reveals and affirms how the appetites and desires of those that live here have also changed. International foods, restaurants and markets are not only ubiquitous, but a defining characteristic of the city. Where, what and how people eat can provide insight into how historical systems of inequality and colonial narratives persist. Growing and developing Canadian culinary identity is a way of challenging the idea of whiteness as a prerequisite for being Canadian. It is a potential way to acknowledge and include immigrant contributions. Food is wrapped up in politics of inequality and injustice, just as much as it is in pleasure and desire. Mapping how food is used as a tool that furthers colonization and racist dogma is key for shifting food to a tool for education and understanding. Food has the power to open up conversation and reshape understandings of Canadian identity through developing and defining a distinct Canadian culinary position. If an understanding about Canadian culinary identity is inclusive of its complex and divergent cultural and political history, then perhaps there is an opportunity to rethink Canadian identity as a whole. The goal of this MRP is to establish that food can be used as an ideological intervention that examines, challenges and reimagines Canadian identity.

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“…The television program Restaurant Makeover, for instance, "ethnicizes" restaurants by reconstructing, cultivating and containing ethnicity. Identity, food, and de´cor are both modernized and folded into signs of difference which are celebrated but also constrained and contradictory, turning ethnicity into a commodity as dishes become part of mainstream culture (Brayton and Millington, 2011).…”

Section: Restaurants Ethnicity and Palestinian Food In Israelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why can’t Palestinian chefs penetrate the boundaries of upscale dining in Israel?

Gvion

¹

2019

Ethnicities

1

0

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Ethnic and professional identities are generally viewed as incongruent. While ethnic cooking is seen as a reproduction of unaltered native dishes, professional cooking raises anticipation of invented culinary novelties. This study asks why Palestinian chefs fail to reconfigure ethnicity as an invaluable asset that enables their restaurant to partake in the realm of haute dining in Israel. The reconfiguration of Palestinian culinary knowledge as sophisticated and up-to-date, I argue, challenges their clients' expectations that Palestinian chefs will prioritize the ethnic component of their identity over the professional one. This vision of Palestinian restaurants prevents the chefs from mobilizing the growing curiosity for ethnic cuisines, as well as the nostalgia for dishes that have disappeared from domestic kitchens, keeping them from penetrating the realm of haute cuisine en route to upward mobility and professional autonomy.

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Renovating ethnic identity onRestaurant Makeover

Cited by 11 publications

References 14 publications

Eating identity: challenging narratives of Canadianness through culinary identity building

Eating identity: challenging narratives of Canadianness through culinary identity building

Eating identity: challenging narratives of Canadianness through culinary identity building

Why can’t Palestinian chefs penetrate the boundaries of upscale dining in Israel?

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