Salt pork and roastin' ears: Food and cooking in a Yuchi community.

Abstract

This study provides biographical sketches of six elder Yuchi women and illuminates their relationship with food and the practice of cooking within the Yuchi food system. Based on ethnographic methods, primarily extensive interviews and participant observation fieldwork, the study takes place in a traditional ceremonial dance ground and a United Methodist Church which was founded by Yuchi people in 1901. The study draws heavily on life histories, revealing a complex of obligations which frame the lives of the participants. In fulfilling these obligations, women engage in symbolic cooking patterns that are carried forward from their childhoods, despite the pressures of contemporary life and their immersion in mainstream American society. The study shows that certain foods act as symbols that support group solidarity, while objects take on metaphorical significance whose meaning is clear to women who participate in communal cooking activities. Taken together, these aspects of food and cooking illustrate dimensions of power which permeate the lives of women as they interact with other members of the Yuchi community and non-Yuchi members of the wider community. Ethnographically, this study contributes valuable insights into the lives of Yuchi women and their role in the maintenance of cultural identity. More broadly, this study contributes to a growing trend toward the consideration of informal, everyday practices which act as integrative mechanisms for perpetuating group identity and cohesion.