Cooking to be Modern but Eating to be Healthy

The Role of Dawa-Dawa in Contemporary Ghanaian Foodways

Dados Bibliográficos

ID12799232
AutoresJessica R Ham (Princeton University, autor correspondente)
Ano2017
Volume20
Fascículo2
Páginas237-256
Data de publicação2017-04-03
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoFood Culture & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1552-8014 • E-ISSN: 1751-7443
EditoraRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/15528014.2017.1305827
OpenAlexW2611952714
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas14
Referências citadas34

Dawa-dawa, the Hausa name for the fermented paste made from the seeds of the African locust bean tree (Parkia biglobosa) is a widely used ingredient in soups in the semi-arid regions of West Africa. With a very distinctive odor and taste, the perceived palatability of dawa-dawa has decreased over the past few decades, a shift in taste that has occurred alongside the increased availability of industrially produced bouillon cubes marketed for soup preparation. Instead of dichotomizing dawa-dawa and bouillon cubes, the intent of this paper is to use dawa-dawa as a means to explore how global pressures complexly contribute to processes of dietary change in rural West Africa. In this context there are two distinguishable fronts of global capitalism—one that shapes norms of what it means to be a “modern” cook or eater and one that shapes preferred and healthy diets as inaccessible. The intersection of these two processes produces what I argue are eaters in rural Upper West Ghana who overtly disregard dawa-dawa for its sensual properties, but who simultaneously and in a more covert manner retain alliance to its nutritional contribution

Archaeology · Art · Context (archaeology · Geography · Humanities · Taste · African Botany and Ecology Studies · Chemistry · Organic Food and Agriculture · Food Science