Food as Bridge: Belonging and Transnationalism in the Culinary Culture of Chinese Immigrants in Early 20th-Century Chicago

This thesis discusses how early 20th-century Chinese immigrants in the United States negotiated their belonging through culinary culture, focusing on the Chinese American community in Chicago. While Asian American scholarship predominantly centers on coastal cities like San Francisco and New York, Chicago offers a unique perspective as a significant hub for Chinese immigration. Utilizing artifacts from the Chinese American Museum of Chicago (CAMOC)—including menus, dishware, restaurant advertisements, and imported items from China—I explore how culinary practices facilitated cultural preservation, adaptation, and a transnational connection with the homeland amidst exclusionary laws and social marginalization. By analyzing culinary practices as symbols of both adaptation and preservation, this study investigates how Chinese immigrants settled in the host society and defended against the stigmatization fueled by anti-Chinese hostility. Drawing on Hobsbawm and Ranger's concept of invented tradition and Homi Bhabha's notion of hybridity, this paper situates CAMOC's culinary collections within the socio-political landscape of early Chinese American communities in Chicago. Interpreting these culinary artifacts as primary sources, this paper contributes to current discussions on the formation and transformation of the diasporic community's belonging amidst shifting cultural dynamics and ongoing connections to their homeland.