Thesis Help again (oh boy!)

[revelationtrib]

I am an undergrad student studying primarily cultural anthropology. My main areas of subject are Asian American studies and racial/ethnic dynamics, and I've been in the Philippines for one month trying to find a research subject for my senior thesis next year. I was planning to do something on mestizo/as, but lately I've been steered into different

Comments

[avuxeni]

What a great question. Unfortunately, I don't have any resources that can help answer this, but I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the colonization of the Philippines by the U.S...? Although I'm not citing any research here, I'm wondering whether, in general, colonizers bring their OWN food and favor it over local cuisine. I'm thinking of all of the French bakeries in Vietnam and Senegal, for example. But this is just me thinking out loud.

I live in NoVA, too, and you're right. I can't think of a single Filipino restaurant, but Korean, Chinese and Vietnamese abound. Interesting.

[iloveyouohno]

I live in northern Virginia, too (and am Asian-American, whoo!). In addition to those types of restaurants, you also see a lot of Indian, Japanese, and Thai restaurants.

As for stereotypes, I can't think of anything except from Hawaii (where both of my parents grew up), where they sometimes poke fun at Filipinos for eating dogs. Here is a clip from the famous Hawaiian comedian Frank De Lima's "Best of De Lima Too" where he, as the former First Lady Imelda after her fall from power, tries to sell tupperware for adobo.

[iloveyouohno]

Oh, and this is not helpful, but it is funny (see Thai Palace).

[jryson]

Not many German places in the South, either.

[caketime]

I live in Switzerland, and in Geneva the Philippine community is big. Then again, I'm half-Filipina, half-Swiss, so it would be natural for me to know the Philippine community. At any rate, sorry for being no help at all. I have no idea where balut originates from. I find dinuguan "exotic" as well, in case you need any tips for more unusual foods.

Re: I have a paper to write and therefore am commenting entries on my FriendsFriends page.

[minkdolores]

Filipinos tend to throw a lot of banquet parties, where it's easier to order out for 5 million egg rolls and dessert dishes than spend the time making 'em at home, and relatively inexpensive, too.

yay circumcision

my papers are getting pretty bad too

[revelationtrib]

I definitely agree with the goals of the immigrating folks--it seems a lot of them are military, nurses, or lawyers, so why would you bother to open up a restaurant? that's one of the reasons i'm focusing on VA/DC instead of Cali or big cities like NYC or Chicago (which seem to have every kind of restaurant)

[mallyns]

that stew where they cook the goat in its own vomit..

Who would eat that?

Lots of people are picker eaters, or have food allergies and if you don't know what is in a food you wont eat it. I'm allergic to fish and shellfish this limits the places I can go.

I'm not sure if that will help but it might give you some ideas on why people wont eat stuff.

[minkdolores]

there's always "chocolate soup," pork stewed in pork blood, too. yum yum. i stopped eating it when i was told what it was. before it was like "YUM SAUCE."

i could see this stuff being developed by hungry hungry people. why they bring it into developed countries can be chalked up to cultural adherence, i guess. yum blood sauce.

Somebody down there in comments brought up anthony bourdain, but andrew zimmern does stuff like that too (i believe on the same channel), and he visited some place in rural sub-saharan Africa where there were literally only about three types of food sources, a tree being one of them, which they had the option of turning into ground porridge, bread, or fermenting underground for later use. Fermented organic material stored in the ground eaten weeks later? I feel like that is largely a product of desperation. or extreme experimentation, depending on how you look at it, I guess. maybe both.

[jryson]

It probably has more to do with the popularity of the big three(Mexican, Italian, Chinese) than something the others, such as Philippine. These all have networks, and the more successful have developed chains.

That may come partly from the size of these ethnic communities within the US. That gives them an advantage, as does the effectiveness of networking. A beginning restaurateur may need a rich uncle to fund her. She had her apprenticeship in a restaurant like she wants to start. She may be able to buy an established place, as its previous owner moves on to something bigger.

If you come here and find a more modest population, you will find fewer opportunities for this kind of networking.