Cultural Appropriation and Globalization
Anyi Li
As more and more immigrants migrate to America, along with the surge of Chinese international students in America, more and more Chinese restaurants spring up in the United States, especially near colleges and in populated cities.
After arriving in America, I always miss the taste of food from home. When my host family brought me to a Chinese restaurant, I made a few discoveries: there are dishes such as the Orange Chicken and the General Tso's Chicken which I had never seen in China. I understand the meaning of every word, but I just had no idea what they are. My American host parents had to explain to me what Orange Chicken and General Tso's Chicken are inside a Chinese restaurant. When the food is served, I discover that everything is sweeter, less salty, and less spicy. The majority of food is very meaty, while in reality, more than half of good Chinese dishes don't have much meat in them.
Later on, I found out that Orange Chicken and General Tso's Chicken are not original Chinese dishes, but Chinese American immigrants' inventions to court American taste. Since Americans eat a lot of meat and sugar and can't take food that is too spicy or too salty, these Chinese restaurants purposely appropriated their dishes to suit American eating habits. In the process, the Chinese cultural emphasis of variability, nutrition, season, nature, aestheticism, temperament, enjoyment, and the different social, regional, political, and religious backgrounds, revealed through different eating habits and cuisine styles, all disappeared to appropriate to American tastes. Chinese food's cultural meaning in America also appropriates to limited, representative dishes such as steamed dumplings and chow mein. In some heavily populated metropolitan areas such as New York City and among non-Christian religious entities such as the Jews, Chinese food even gradually becomes the traditional, cultural Christmas Eve feast. With globalization, I can enjoy some tastes of home while studying in a nation across the Pacific. However, I don't get to eat authentic food and disconnect from the original Chinese food culture.
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