Political and Cultural Narratives
Self-Agency, Upward Mobility and the Dismissal of the Palestinian National Narrative: The Case of Palestinian Chefs in Israel
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Liora Gvion
Traditionally, Palestinian restaurants in Israel abstained from serving dishes associated with dishes which women had learned to prepare from significant others, as part of their socialization. Men refrained from ordering such dishes in restaurants either for fear of being taken as undermining traditional female culinary knowledge or for appearing as letting their spouses neglect their domestic duties. The increasing numbers of Palestinian women who have postponed their marriage for the purpose of getting an education and becoming professionals, has generated changes both in domestic Palestinian kitchens and in restaurant menus. The number of women who cook traditional dishes which are often laborious, has decreased versus the integration into the daily diet industrially produced foods and dishes popular in Israeli kitchens. Consequently, a new generation of Palestinian chefs who have been working all over Israel has started serving these dishes in their restaurants, either in their original or upgraded version. This decision, I argue, positions the chefs as guardians of traditional Palestinian cookery, preventing it from disappeared from the active culinary repertoire. Simultaneously, their entrepreneurial action positions Palestinians and their foods in new locations, claiming acknowledgement, recognition of their presence in Israel and right to partake in the contemporary local culinary scene.
Making the Tradition: Recovery and Reinventing of the Jingshan Tea Ceremony, Hangzhou, China
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Jie Yan
As a commodity that could be identified with Buddhism, tea has been an essential part of the monastery life in Chinese Buddhist temples since the mid-eighth century. According to the local people’s narrations, the Jingshan temple in Hangzhou held a “Jingshan Tea Ceremony” to treat guests since the Song dynasty, and the ceremony was transmitted to Japan, which later greatly affected the Japanese tea ceremony. Moreover, “Jingshan Tea Ceremony” was enrolled in China’s National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2010. However, recent scholars inclined to admit that the “Jingshan Tea Ceremony” is a fake concept which first appeared nowhere but in an article of 1983 by a tea expert promoting the local tea. Despite the fact that the concept is open to doubt, the temple is sparing no effort to restore the Chan tea ceremony to go with its reconstruction, while the local authorities and tea companies are recovering a folk version of the ceremony and to make it a significant part of the local Chan tea culture as well. Through ethnographic field research and through analysis of primary source material on the history of the temple, this paper will focus on the Buddhists elites’ and local people’s practices of the recovery and reinvention of the Jingshan tea ceremony. The cooperation, tension, and negotiation between different social agents diversified and enriched the local people’s understanding of the Chan tea culture, and the Jingshan tea and the tea ceremony have become the identity-laden cultural capital to make the place.
Technology, Performance, and the Invention of Chinese Tea Culture
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Jean De Bernardi
In Wuyi Mountain, tea farmers produce some of the world's most expensive black and oolong teas. The local government cooperates with private businesses to promote the tea known as Da Hong Pao (Big Red Robe) through a variety of cultural displays and performances, including a 4D film in a tea museum, outdoor cultural performances, and a nightly performance of Impression Dahongpao, and open air performances created by a production team led by the film producer Zhang Yimou. These exhibits and performances combine modern visual technologies with drama and dance to produce a material identity for Wuyi Mountain and its teas.
