Border food and food on the border: meaning and practice in Mexican haute cuisine

Restaurants and their attendant practices are high-profile sites at which regional and national cuisines are experienced, experimented with, and negotiated. In particular, they are important settings for the consumption and production of national identity—a crucial space through which to understand the coalescing of the material and representational. This article focuses specifically on the production side of the pairing through an examination of restaurants that are part of a prominent culinary movement (alta cocina mexicana) in the Mexican border town of Tijuana. The central argument of the paper is that Tijuana's culinary scene is indicative of the reassertion of boundaries between Mexico and the USA through the intentional rejection of northern stereotypes of Mexican food. The emphasis on traditional Mexican cuisine, rather than an internationally hybrid cosmopolitan approach, suggests that chefs are adhering to a set of rules that reflect Mexicanness. Restaurants propagating alta cocina mexicana work to differentiate the border and act as social devices which both complicate conventional understandings of Mexican food and disrupt hegemonic discourses of the border as productive of hybridity.     

Selling Maize in Mexico: The Persistence of Peasant Farming in an Era of Global Markets

The last decade of the twentieth century was heralded as the ‘end of agrarian reform’ in Mexico and the initiation of a new era of market‐led agricultural policy and practice. The impact of neoliberalism and the North American Free Trade Agreement on smallholder maize production has been widely conceived as negative, associated with ecological degradation, rural emigration and cultural erosion. Yet, some twenty years later, all evidence suggests that smallholder maize production is continuing in Mexico, albeit in evolving structures and forms. This article uses a farm‐level survey implemented in three Mexican states to assess the current condition of maize farming in Mexico. The authors revisit past categorizations of Mexican farmers and apply similar approaches to explore what maize‐producing households are doing with their maize, and what current patterns of production imply for future Mexican maize policy. They find evidence of greater persistence and adaptability in Mexican maize farming than is often presented. On the basis of their analysis, they advocate for a reconsideration of the underlying assumptions of public policy, highlighting the heterogeneity of the maize landscape and the unrealized and generally unrecognized potential this heterogeneity represents.     

Land tenure and rancho expansion in Alta California, 1784–1846

Popular writers and historians have viewed the rancho as a symbol of the halcyon days of hispanic California and often have overlooked the role of rancho land grants in changing the land tenure system of Alta California during Mexican occupance. This paper views the rancho as an integral part of a land tenure system under which considerable land was granted and examines the patterns of rancho land grants to 1846. The majority of rancho grants were less than six years old at the end of Mexican rule, but they were instrumental in introducing a new land tenure system which imposed a distinct order and design on the Alta California landscape. The land policies of Mexico have been strikingly persistent; rancho boundaries still constitute a prominent part of the modern landscape of California. As a settlement institution, the rancho was more than boundaries delimiting ownership of land, it was the primary means by which resources were distributed, organized and exploited. While the granting of land in Alta California was a distinctive practice, an investigation of how this land system came about and its impact on the land adds to our understanding of tenure practices in general and in particular provides insights into the way in which cultural and economic values are impressed on the land through land ordinances.     

城市民族餐馆空间分布的区位选择及文化邻近性

民族餐馆是餐饮服务业的特殊形式，认识其行业性质及文化特性是理解民族餐馆空间分布的关键。本研究以郑州、开封和洛阳为案例，从市场区位选择、文化邻近、城市格局等多个维度，对城市民族餐馆分布进行了探索性分析。研究发现，城市民族餐馆分布在空间分布结构上呈等级扩散分布，其集聚核心大多位于城市传统商业服务业中心；商圈、大学、医院等人口密集区，是城市民族餐馆市场选择的重要区位。民族餐馆与城市商圈具有较高的空间重合度，与大学、医院等区位要素空间关系因城而异。商圈周边布局民族餐馆的概率较高；城市民族餐馆在少数民族居住生活区域高度集中，民族商业文化传统对民族餐馆分布具有向心集聚作用。本研究认为城市民族餐馆分布取决于城市发展格局、市场区位选择及文化邻近的综合作用，民族餐馆的分布概率因城市规模大小、区位地点差异及空间尺度而发生变化。     

The New Mexico-Centered Hispano Homeland

Like mexicano for Mexican, Hispano is a gender-neutral term that has been used increasingly since the 1960s as a substitute for the more cumbersome Spanish American. In their New Mexico-centered homeland, Hispanos adjusted to the natural environment, stamped it with their culture, and from both the natural environment and the cultural landscape created a sense of place or a homeland identity. The word in Spanish that comes closest to capturing the Hispanos' concept of their homeland is patria, which means fatherland.     

From central place to central flow theory: an exploration of urban catering

ABSTRACT

The research shift from central place theory to central flow theory has demonstrated the influence of information technology on cities. The study explores this shift at the city scale of urban catering industry in Nanjing, China. A comprehensive set of indicators of E-WoM for the catering industry has been established. Based on this, the spatial distribution patterns of catering industry in Nanjing, China have been discussed to examine the relationship of restaurants distribution and the central place theory or the central flow theory using a data analytical approach. The results revealed that the spatial distribution of restaurants’ density in Nanjing follows a traditional central place theory, but the spatial distribution of restaurants’ E-WoM in Nanjing rather follows the central flow theory. In addition, different characteristics could be found in different types of restaurants’ E-WoM distribution. Mainstream cuisine follows central place theory but is inconsistent in urban business districts, which demonstrate some characteristics of central flow theory. The distribution of E-WoM of non-mainstream cuisine is similar to the E-WoM distribution of overall restaurants, showing a central flow pattern. Finally, the implications of the study are drawn.     

Interview with Adrián Curiel Rivera

Adrián Curiel Rivera is a Mexican novelist, short-story writer and academic. In addition to his novels Vikingos (2012), A bocajarro (2008) and Bogavante (2000), and the collections of stories Día franco (2016) and Madrid al través (2003), he has published two substantial volumes of critical essays, Los piratas del Caribe en la novelística hispanoamericana del siglo XIX (2010) and Novela española y boom hispanoamericano (2006). In 2013 he published Blanco Trópico, an excoriating and often hilarious fictional account of life in the Mexican Academy in the wake of sweeping neoliberal reforms in the university sector, the nature and consequences of which will be all too familiar to many European and US academics. The book caused something of a storm in his native Mexico. In the following interview, which took place in the summer of 2016, he discusses the genesis of and reactions to the novel, but also touches on a broad range of social and literary issues which the book raises: globalization, publishing, the Mexican literary canon and its sacred cows, as well as the place of the campus novel and science fiction in the current Latin American literary landscape.     

Time to Say Goodbye

Tim Hortons’ first donut store was established in Hamilton, Ontario, in 1964; other stores were added over time as the chain gradually diffused across Canada to become the country’s largest quick-service restaurant chain with more than 2,400 restaurants. In achieving this dominant status it adopted one of the strategies of any successful restaurant chain; utilizing a uniform architectural style to emphasize to customers the consistency in its menu and operations. This article examines the processes underlying the development of the Tim Hortons brand and the diffusion of its restaurants into the US, specifically the appearance of their restaurants in the Great Lakes borderlands. The study found a consistent architectural style in Ontario but several different styles in Michigan and New York. It is suggested that this lack of consistency in brand identification in its US restaurants is a contributory factor to their lack of profitability and smaller sales.     

基于网络评论内容分析的餐饮消费者行为研究

网络评论是餐饮消费者潜意识中的消费偏好、感知等内在需求的外显投射,是其餐饮消费中最关注内容的外在显现。文章基于内容分析法,以大众点评网为例,对餐饮消费者的网络评论内容进行分析。结果表明:高价位餐厅消费者较低价位餐厅消费者的满意度评价更高,连锁餐厅消费者较单体餐厅消费者满意度更高;不同消费水平的消费者消费偏好有明显差异,低价位餐厅消费者更关注核心诉求,即食物本身的吸引力和价格高低,中价位餐厅消费者更关注服务,高价位餐厅的消费者更关注餐厅的综合品质,消费决策中更看重餐厅的环境、服务等非食物要素;从消费感知角度看,餐饮消费者最关注的前五位要素是:食物、环境、服务、价格和便利性。     

Storytelling and meal experience concepts

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study is to explore how storytelling with local and regional origin can be used to develop meal experience concepts in restaurants. Focus is on Nordic food from the perspective of the experience economy. The first goal is to analyse the transformation of menus into experience concepts and dining areas into experiencescapes. The second goal is to investigate if storytelling activities in restaurants can lead to destination development. It is also reflected upon if meal experience storytelling in restaurants has implications for consumers’ everyday food consumption. Three cases in Sweden and Norway with different storytelling strategies are selected. In all these cases, the stories are unique, the places are linked to the stories and the personnel take part in the storytelling activities. The stories are easy to communicate and easy for the target group to connect to. The menus are linked to the story and are all based on local Nordic food culture and local food products. The menus are set and offered in experiencescapes that in various ways fit the stories. The concepts have contributed to the destinations with more visitors, more collaboration among businesses and increased media attention.     

Roadside Restaurants and Place-Product-Packaging

With roots in the cafe, diner and tea room, various kinds of roadside restaurants evolved after 1920: roadside stands, highway coffee shops, drive-ins, outdoor walk-ups and indoor walk-ups. Together they came to represent a distinctive kind of place along the American roadside. Large corporations came to dominate highway-oriented restaurants after 1960 through “place-product-packaging”: the coordination of building design, decor, menu, service and pricing under distinctive logos. This total design in merchandising has contributed to the standardization of roadside landscapes and travel in the United States. Roadside eateries are safe, predictable oases for strangers away from home.     

Branding halal: A photographic essay on global Muslim markets (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

In the rapidly expanding global market for halal products, Malaysia and Singapore hold a special position as the only two countries in the world where state bodies certify halal products, spaces (shops, factories and restaurants) as well as work processes. In these two countries and in shops all around the world, consumers can find state halal‐certified products that carry distinctive halal marks. This photographic essay explores the properties of halal marks in Malaysia and Singapore within a framework of visual systems and the conditions of their interpretation, relating the particular systems to the complexities of which they are a part. More specifically, I explore the visual systems of halal marks on products, advertisements, shops as well as restaurants.     

炒杂碎：美国餐饮史中的华裔文化

本文通过美国华人杂碎馆兴衰史,从一个新的视角来说明中餐馆在美国的兴起和普及。杂碎馆反映了华裔文化移植到美国社会并进一步在那里发展的过程。在美国,饮食是最早而且可能是最有代表性的海外中华文化的标志。华人的饮食文化伴随着他们的生活方式、劳动和职业技能、经商能力和资本、家庭及其他文化传统与华人移民一起进入美国。炒杂碎是美国社会族裔文化如何形成的一个有示范性意义的例子。     

银元主币流通与上海洋厘行市的更替

墨西哥鹰洋成为近代中国流通最广的银元主币,历时长达60余年之久。1914年后开铸的袁世凯像新币,逐渐取代鹰洋成为流通中的主币。上海钱业公所和其后的上海钱业公会深谙流通中主币的消长变化态势,审时度势,先后于1915年和1919年取消龙洋和鹰洋行市。鹰洋行市的取消进一步促使国币通行成为主币,使货币兑换市场逐步走向统一,降低社会交易成本;同时也为废两改元准备了条件,促进了近代货币统一化进程。     

A Geometric Morphometric Study of Regional Craniofacial Variation in Mexico

Spanish speaking populations in the USA have long been categorised under the umbrella term ‘Hispanic’, which is a cultural construct. The term Hispanic ignores the unique ethnohistories and biological variation among Hispanic groups with various European, African and indigenous American influences. Considerable heterogeneity has been identified in pre‐contact America and has continued to influence the cultural and biological compositions of various regions today. The purpose of this research is to examine biological variation in Mexico, which was influenced by indigenous migration patterns and the Old World conquests of the Americans. Using multivariate statistics, this paper compares 16 three‐dimensional craniometric landmarks of samples from northern Central Mexico, northern Yucatan and western Mexico to examine the regional biological variation present in Mexico in both prehistoric and historic groups and also compares Mexican, Spanish and African American groups to examine patterns of Old World conquests. Multivariate statistics detected significant group differences for both size and shape (centroid size, p < 0.0001; shape, p < 0.0001) and showed that while significantly different, all the Mexican groups are more similar to one another except for one prehistoric inland‐western Mexican group, which is morphologically distinct from the other Mexican groups. Previous mtDNA research in these areas shows a low prevalence of African American admixture and a high indigenous component in the northern Mexican groups, which is consistent with the findings of this paper. The prehistoric and historic Mexican groups were the most similar indicating the retention of indigenous admixture after contact. The results from this analysis demonstrate that all groups are significantly different from one another supporting other findings that have shown that the indigenous populations of the New World are heterogeneous and that this variation may also contribute to the heterogeneity of contemporary populations. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Engaging territorio cuerpo-tierra through body and community mapping: a methodology for making communities safer

We propose a new way of collectively creating data about gender violence through active participation and mapping women’s bodies and communities. We see this process of data creation, self-awareness and action as inherently linked to the native concept territorio cuerpo-tierra, the landscape of bodies-lands. The concept erases Western notions separating bodies and land and helps to decenter the public–private divide, which is an important obstacle to eliminating violence against women. Drawing on data from our work with Mexican women in the, U.S. and Mexico, we illuminate the continuity of women’s individual bodily experience of violence and collective spatial knowledge of community safety. We conclude that the process and outcomes of body and community mapping linking bodies and land, afford planners the prospect of engaging as partners and co-actants with community members in the goal of making places safe for women.     

Monuments and nationalism in modern Mexico

A key feature in the cultural repertoire of Mexican nationalism has been the excavation and reconstruction of the archaeological sites and monuments of the pre‐Hispanic past. They afford tangible witness to the foundations of Mexican history and the putative existence of the Mexican people in the civilisations of Mesoamerica. Although in the colonial period creole patriots identified the Aztec empire as their classical past, it was not until the Mexican Revolution that archaeological sites and monuments were integrated into the nationalism that accompanied and characterised that movement. The chief author of this cultural turn was Manuel Gamio, a professional archaeologist and liberal nationalist, whose extensive writings thus demand attention. But although he emphasised the grandeur of the pre‐Hispanic civilisation, he advocated the complete incorporation of the contemporary Indian peasantry into the Mexican nation.     

The weight of nineteenth century Mexicans in the Western United States

When traditional methods for measuring economic welfare are scarce or unreliable, heights and BMIs are now well-accepted measurements that represent biological conditions during economic development. Weight, after controlling for height, is an additional measure for current net nutrition. Little is known about how weights varied among Mexicans living in the nineteenth century American West. Between 1870 and 1920, average Mexican weight was low and remained constant. Mexican farmers had the heaviest weights, and unskilled worker weights were low. Weight of Mexican-born individuals were higher than Mexicans born in the United States at low weights but lower at high weights. For combined characteristics, weight varied the most with age, an uncontrollable characteristic, indicating that nineteenth century Mexican current net nutrition varied the most with factors over which they had no control.     

Vital Creativity: Exhibiting Beauty and Heritage in Material Culture

Museum exhibits are an important but often overlooked source of anthropological, folklore and decorative art analyses. Some exhibits are cross-cultural and focus on object types; others deal with the cultures of particular peoples. This review assesses two exhibit catalogues that deal with each of these two types: Gavin, Pierce, and Pleguezuelo's Cerámica y Cultura: The Story of Spanish and Mexican Mayólica deals with one art form and its development, and Griffith's Hecho a Mano: The Traditional Arts of Tucson's Mexican American Community documents the home arts of Mexican Americans in Tucson, Arizona during the 1990s.     

少数民族地区旅游发展的战略联盟与网络构建——以广东连南瑶族自治县为例

本文根据战略联盟和战略网络理论,以广东连南瑶族自治县为例,探讨了少数民族地区旅游发展的战略联盟与网络构建。文章认为连南县旅游发展战略联盟应考虑旅游的前竞争联盟、后竞争联盟和竞争性联盟,在此基础上,构建连南县的旅游战略网络。