Communiqué 43: Of all the things to fall apart

What a debate about the film adaptation of an African literary classic tells us about global cultural goods.

Illustration by DALL-E

1. Little Italy

I’ve been thinking a lot about food—about the ways a meal could taste in one part of a country in comparison to how it tastes in another simply because the ingredients readily available are different. How the same meal cooked with so much spice in one region could be a lot milder in another. How a group of outsiders can come into a community, take inspiration from their local dishes, and then adapt ingredients to suit their taste. How people are forced to adapt recipes (use different vegetables, soup bases, meats, etc.) whenever they move into a new country. Or how the influx of a new group of people into a community comes with new culinary flavors.

In essence, food is one of the best ways to understand the spread of culture globally. Take a cue from the Italians.

Towards the end of the 19th century, there was a massive influx of Italian migrants into the U.S. This wave of migration, according to The Atlantic, “was ultimately responsible for pasta’s becoming a staple of the American middle class.” But it took a while for this to catch on. More than five million Italians moved to America between 1880 and 1921, and when they did, the food they brought along with them and consumed (pasta, hard cheese, vegetables, fruit, and garlic) turned many people off. The Italians went as far as growing vegetables and herbs they could find in America and importing “appalling sums” of hard cheese. Today, Italian food is a huge part of American culture and global cuisine. Some of the recipes have changed, some have adapted their ingredients to their new environment, but a lot has also stayed the same.