‘Food, Honor, and Love’ – Changes in the culture of food following the Ethiopian immigration to Israel
Abstract
Changes in the culture of food following the Ethiopian immigration to Israel reveal different aspects of family and community life of Ethiopian Jews along the historical timeline. Ethiopian Jews, “Beta Israel”, lived as a minority ethnic and religious group with special and unique features, among other neighbor groups. Nowadays, Ethiopian Jews evoke great interest in the Jewish world and Israel, as well as in literature research dealing with this subject, due to the importance of the cultural insights that arise on group life in Ethiopia and Israel’s new cultural context.
In this article, I propose an additional point of view that combines historical with anthropological aspects of this subject.
Food culture containing norms, values, tastes, and odors, such as food sources and work division around cooking, may highlight issues related to gender and femininity, and teach us about the way of life in the village and the social rules and religious meanings that have been associated with the food culture of Ethiopian Jewry. Besides, the story of immigration and absorption of Ethiopian Jews to Israel, and the Beta Israel in particular, reveals processes and transformations related to food culture. Therefore, this article may reflect the “culinary negotiations” taking place in the Ethiopian Jewish community generations in Israel, between the desire to preserve cultural values and patterns from their
country of origin, along with the adoption and adaptation of new values and norms of society, an issue that may affect social, cultural, and gender consequences.
