working through my concept for the short doc...

What does being Chinese Canadian mean? In Ien Ang’s study of “Chineseness” in post-structuralist society, she discusses the ambiguity of ethnic identity for those who have been displaced from “the motherland” She raises the idea that “’China’ can no longer be limited to the more or less fixed area of its official spatial and cultural boundaries nor can it be held up as providing the authentic, authoritative, and uncontested standard for all things Chinese” (Ang, 1998). Rather, the Chinese diaspora is spread like seeds, all over the world, as Chinese identification becomes something to be shaped by the local context and people’s ways of living.

To be Chinese Canadian is to be pulled between two cultures, while not truly being one or the other. It also means there is a need for reconciliation…for myself, there is a desire to connect with my own Chinese history, but I struggle because I’m submerged in Canadian culture and often the two conflict. However, I think one of the ways in which reconciliation happens is through the cultural practice of sharing a meal. Eating cultural food is a medium of communication; it is a way to reconnect with my Chinese past while incorporating the influences of my North American upbringing. Around a dinner table, there may be traditional dishes (that often have historical meaning), and there may be hybrid dishes, because immigrant families have learned to use local products in their cooking. I believe that cooking and eating cultural food, although only an aspect of a daily routine, is an extremely powerful example of how immigrant families connect to their ethnic history and to one another. It can serve to reconcile the cultural anxiety around “hybrid identities” and be a tool for personal meaning-making.