Madhushree Ghosh: Safar, Gebunden

Klappentext

Blends memoir and history to explore the role of Punjabi food in fostering community and identity among South Asian refugees and immigrants.

Safar: Finding Home, History, and Culture through Punjabi Food in the American West is the journey of South Asian refugees, immigrants and their children-in particular, Sikhs, Jats and Muslims-who moved to the southwestern states of America over centuries as farmers, truck drivers, restaurant owners and dhaba / diner stall cooks. An expedition in search of the asli or real Punjabi food, the author explores how their food traveled from British India pre-partition (1947) to now, covering the different waves of Punjabi immigration to the southwest through the years as a result of war, fear, deprivation or for a better future.

Interwoven in Safar is the author's own immigrant journey as a graduate student to America in 1993, her quest to find home through the food her Bengali refugee parents made which then translated to a physical journey she embarked on to visit the different Punjabi communities in California, Arizona and New Mexico. The book is divided into parts, focusing on four Punjabi women, each a part of a different wave of South Asian immigrants to the American West, and the food and recipes they brought with them that connect them to their pasts.

Safarshares stories of displacement, discrimination, community, and hope alongside how families build, grow, fade and new family structures happen. It seeks answers to the universal question of immigrant journeys and the true meaning of home, of comfort food and what constitutes a 'true Punjabi' meal, as well as the question of what fusion / hybrid foods and communities meant in the times of restricted citizenship and anti-miscegenation laws. Food is an essential tool-something we all need to survive-and when immigrants travel, settle and create new worlds, how do they bring the country they left to their new land through their food?