Dining table as a battlefield: Chinese immigrant brides' food practice after migration

This study aims to explore the complexities embedded in food habits/practices in the cross-border marriages between Taiwanese men and Chinese women.  Analyses are based upon data collected through ethnographic research conducted in various sites in Taiwan. 

Food is not only a necessity in daily life, but also a site where gender, class, and ethnicity intersect.  Chinese immigrant brides, as marriage migrants, are usually depicted as gold diggers in the Taiwanese mass media.  They suffer various forms of discrimination not only from the general public but also within their own families.  The cross-border marriages between Taiwanese men and Chinese immigrant brides often adopt a “three generation cohabitation” living arrangement, and in this research the dining table becomes a battlefield with intergenerational conflicts between Taiwanese mother-in-law and Chinese daughter-in-law.  Taiwanese mothers-in-law tend to criticize Chinese immigrant brides’ culinary skills and food practices.  Moreover, Taiwanese mothers-in-law associate certain characteristics of Chinese immigrant brides’ food habits such as the way they use condiments with the socio-economic background.  One common saying among Taiwanese mothers-in-law is that because these Chinese immigrant brides come from a less developed country, therefore they do not possess modern knowledge of low-sodium and low-fat diet, and their food practice is harmful to the second generation.  The difference between Taiwanese and Chinese food habits thus become interweaved with sensitive cross-strait politics.  Facing such criticism, Chinese immigrant brides often claim that unlike many restaurants in Taiwan, what they cook are the real “authentic” Chinese food.  This research argues that though being stigmatized, Chinese immigrant brides are not without agency.  They develop a nationalist discourse as a strategy of resistance – a means of asserting their subjectivity and the legitimacy of being a good mother.