A Tiger In The Kitchen Analysis

Food is the material object that people have the most intimate contact with on a daily basis. Most people are almost constantly preoccupied physically and mentally with food. Not only because it is a vital part of human life, but also because it is a threshold to different cultures. People spend time with food preparing meals everyday and thinking about what to eat for lunch or dinner, but beyond simple human obligation, eating has important implications on how people think of themselves, and mainly how they relate it to a specific culture in which they are a part of. Food and cultural identity both form a strong bond, as it is depicted in A Tiger in the Kitchen, by Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan. The state of diaspora, or assimilation into another culture, and the desire to preserve memory of one’s identity through taste, is a condition many immigrants face as memories of their past shun upon them. Food can sometimes create a barrier between cultures, as many people are reluctant to eat food that is

By trying to find a happy medium between their home culture and the new culture at hand, many of these immigrants face major changes in their home cuisines. Whether they are devout to their culinary culture and are reluctant to change or completely integrate to the new culture, as seen by the Vietnamese children, the meshing of two cultures, is in a way inevitable. As seen through many of the research and interviews, this leads to a high degree of identity confusion in immigrants as they face many forms of cultural tension. However, finding a happy medium between the two cultures at hand, with food as a stronghold, brings out the best solution and gives the individuals a taste of both cultures. Mixing and incorporating aspects of both heritages is what ultimately leads to fused and stronger identities in