Eleventh International Conference on Food Studies

Abstract

Culinary art, such as cooking food, serving and other skills related to the preparation of meals, is usually regarded as a practice that confines women within the world of domesticity. At the same time, food is also related to one’s native culture. In this paper, I explore how culinary art, apart from reflecting a nostalgic longing for home, act as a refuge to women, especially South Asian diasporic women, who despite being away from their homeland are victims of patriarchal oppression. For the diasporic women, food is not only associated with their gastronomy but it also helps in recollecting their pasts. Even in the absence of authentic ingredients, they insist on cooking traditional food by modifying old recipes. The emotional and psychological turmoil that female immigrants undergo result in being rooted in their pasts and can lead to alienation, melancholia and nostalgia. This struggle is depicted in Jhumpa Lahiri’s “Mrs. Sen’s,” the sixth short story in her collection, Interpreter of Maladies (1999). The narrative explores the life of a young Indian woman, Mrs. Sen, who accompanies her husband to the US. For her, “home” refers to Calcutta and not the apartment in New England. Her desire to recreate home culture in the host nation acknowledges the pain that is involved in the journey and the process of settling down. I investigate how culinary art not only acts as a medium of preserving and recreating home culture for the protagonist but also how it contributes to the transformation of female identity.