This paper examines how cultures of food and eating in South Korea (henceforth, Korea) shape people’s experiences of other cultures and identities. In particular, it focuses on the relationship between the consumption of ethnic food and multiculturalism in everyday contexts in multicultural Korea. By doing so, the aim is to understand how food helps us to think about multiculturalism in everyday contexts. Hence, this paper characterizes “multicultural streets” in Wongok-dong using Marc Auge’s(1995) concept of a “non-place” as well as the concept of “conviviality” originally introduced by Paul Gilroy(2004). This paper argues that the public pedagogy of consumption of ethnic food, as situated in a specific local site such as Wongok-dong in Korea, provides an invaluable opportunity for not only critically reflecting on the current problems associated with food politics, but also overcoming the limits of the ethnocentric and official multiculturalism seen in Korea.
Abstract
Introduction
Food and multiculturalism
Contextualizing public pedagogies of ethnic food in Korea
Problematizing the food politics in Wongok-dong as a site of multiculturalism in Korea
Toward a localized public pedagogy of eating ethnic food
Conclusion
References