Eating Satay Babi: sensory perception of transnational movement

This paper critically examines the linkages between the sensory aspects of food, memory, identity and life in a transnational context between Malaysia and Australia. By engaging with work done in the fields of phenomenology and sensory anthropology, which highlight the role that sensory perception and embodied experience have in assisting in cultural interpretation – the means through which cultural, personal and historical memories are encoded within foods and enable a Proustian “remembrance of things past” is explored. Drawing upon fieldwork being undertaken in Melbourne and Penang, this paper uses the tastes, smells, sights, textures and sounds of Malaysian food to navigate and map: histories of migrations; the personal and cultural memories encoded within the production and consumption of food; the transnational movement of ingredients, recipes and utensils used in its production; and the intercultural fabric of Melbourne. This paper was originally presented at the Migration, Affect and Senses Conference, the Centre for Cross Cultural Research, Australian National University, June 2004. During the presentation the satay babi was cooked, ingredients were passed around, felt, smelt and tasted and the satay was consumed.