Food, culture, and identity in multicultural societies: Insights from Singapore

The choice of food practices can be influenced by one's identity in many societies, but has mostly been evaluated in light of the maintenance of cultural identity in migrant populations. This study focused on understanding the influence of identity on food practices among individuals in multicultural societies. We conducted 18 focus group discussions (n = 130) among Indian, Chinese and Malay women in Singapore. Focus group transcripts were analysed using Thematic Analysis both inductively and deductively. Deductive analysis was framed within a Social Representations Approach, a social psychological theory that allows a deeper understanding of the contextual aspects of identity. Participants highlighted the central position of food in social events, cultural celebrations, and persistent traditional beliefs about health (such as ‘hot-cold balance’). These beliefs extended to the perception of certain traditional foods possessing medicinal properties. Importantly, the consumption of these traditional foods was accepted as necessary for the maintenance of health by the women.

We propose that while cultural food practices are integral to identity preservation and identity continuity for Singaporean women from all three racial groups, this is different to other multicultural societies such as Canada where communities preserve their cultural food practices, in part, due to fear of cultural identity loss. In addition, cross-cultural food practices are readily adopted in participants' daily lives for a number of reasons such as the promotion of health, convenience, and variety. At times, this adoption blurred boundaries between different cultural cuisines. Food practices in multicultural societies like Singapore are thus a reflection of everyday multiculturalism, multicultural social policies, and attitudes towards traditional healthful food practices, and these aspects need to be considered in the development of public health policies and interventions.

Culture, race, and ethnicity are intricately connected, important social identities in the study of food and food practices because they allow researchers to understand the complex ways that individuals make decisions about food choice. Cooking and eating practices are often not only symbolic but also tangible and concrete ways that ethnic identities are preserved by migrants in multicultural societies (D’Sylva & Beagan, 2011). There is a strong desire to preserve one's culture through food practices especially when one's culture is not the dominant culture in that society (Beoku-Betts, 1995). However, what is perhaps less studied is the maintenance of cultural food practices and the sharing of cross-cultural food practices by different cultural, racial, and ethnic groups within multicultural societies. Social identities, as both a process and an embodiment of personal characteristics, hold different meanings for individuals as they make sense of their social worlds. Race, for example, is relevant to understanding food practices because racialisation of food practices often takes place in a diverse multicultural societies (Slocum, 2011). Food is also used to assign meaning to oneself (Fischler, 1988), making food practices not only a practical decision influenced by access, environment, and nutritional needs but also one that is fundamentally social, cultural, and psychological (Rozin, 1980). Therefore, understanding the psychology of identity and the importance of different social identities for individuals may help researchers and practitioners examine food choices better (Bisogni, Connors, Devine, & Sobal, 2002) and this is the goal of this paper.

This paper is part of a larger study looking at the determinants of eating habits among Singaporean women. In this paper, we shed light on the many ways that food and food practices are important in the creation and maintenance of social identities in multicultural contexts, and that the preservation of these identities by individuals provides insight into the value placed on traditional food practices. Cross-cultural food practices are often present in multicultural societies and as a result, culture is constantly evolving when different food practices come into contact with each other. This has implications for researchers and practitioners in public health and psychology who wish to understand the interconnected nature of food practices in multicultural societies.