[Many thanks to Peter Jordens for bringing this item to our attention.] Brianne Garrett (Tufts Now): “Vitamin scholar Melissa Fuster is debunking meals stereotypes inside Hispanic Caribbean communities. Within the course of, she presents a considerate method to addressing the group’s diet-related well being inequities.”
For Melissa Fuster, our relationship with consuming isn’t so simple as sitting down for a meal. An affiliate professor of social, behavioral, and inhabitants sciences at Tulane College’s Faculty of Public Well being and Tropical Medication, Fuster explores that complexity in wanting on the function meals performs in Hispanic Caribbean communities in New York Metropolis and throughout the nation.
It’s a ardour that’s been evolving since her time on the Friedman Faculty of Vitamin Science and Coverage, from which she earned her Ph.D. in 2013.
“We don’t have a tendency to actually take a look at historic and ensuing structural elements in vitamin. However the way in which [people in these communities] spoke about meals,” mentioned Fuster of her analysis on the bottom, “it turned very clear it was influenced by previous expertise and historic occasions.”
Fuster is decided to offer this broader context. Impressed by her discoveries and her personal lived expertise migrating from Puerto Rico to Miami at age 21, she launched her e book, Caribeños on the Desk: How Migration, Well being, and Race intersect in New York Metropolis, final yr.
Whereas research present that Hispanic Caribbeans throughout the U.S. are at larger threat of growing diet-related ailments (together with weight problems and diabetes) than non-Hispanic whites, Caribeños on the Desk steps again to have a look at the larger image. It analyzes social and environmental elements that contribute to those well being inequities, like lack of land, proximity to violence and different political battle in addition to institutional limitations to sources together with job alternatives, schooling, and high-quality healthcare.
Vitamin: An Intersectional Strategy
“Should you don’t have entry to schooling, in case you’re continually experiencing discrimination—these features can positively affect eating regimen,” mentioned Fuster, whose work focuses closely on New York, the place the nation’s largest inhabitants of Hispanic Caribbean communities reside. “I take a look at the historical past of those communities—how we obtained to this place and the way that historical past influences our experiences.”
Fuster urges nutritionists, dietitians, and different healthcare professionals to grasp that the way in which individuals throughout the Latin American diaspora are considered shouldn’t be monolithic, nor ought to their relationship to meals—and their total diets—be.
“I feel tradition is certainly vital, however I attempt to have a extra nuanced view of what tradition is,” mentioned Fuster. “I used to be born and raised in an city setting. There are such a lot of completely different layers that influenced me and the way I view Puerto Rican [food culture]. For me, it’s completely different from anyone in Puerto Rico proper now, or anyone that grew up in New York or Boston, or a distinct a part of the nation.”
She added, “That’s one thing that I attempt to do within the e book: to clarify that we’re extra than simply the place we’re from. We’ve got to have a look at individuals on the intersection of what I consult with within the e book as structural elements. Our class, race, gender, age—these are issues that work together with one another and the place we’re from. All of it shapes our views and practices round meals.”
Debunking Stereotypes
It’s additionally frequent for dietitians to hyperlink excessive charges of diet-related ailments to Hispanic Caribbean delicacies, mentioned Fuster, and to counsel that conventional cooking in these cultures consists of fatty meat, starchy roots, and a whole lot of frying.
“After we take into consideration ethnic meals, or immigrant diets, we consider these stereotypes,” mentioned Fuster. “Like ‘You’re Puerto Rican, so that you solely eat rice and beans’… issues like that. What I attempt to do is present that the Caribbean is a melting pot. There are, sadly, some inaccurate concepts about what we eat.” [. . .]
For full article, see https://now.tufts.edu/2022/10/06/complex-intersections-food-health-and-history-hispanic-caribbean-communities
Additionally see earlier submit https://repeatingislands.com/2022/10/09/new-book-caribenos-at-the-table/