‘Food Voice’: The Culinary Landscape in Cecilia M. Fernandez’s "Leaving Little Havana. A Memoir of Miami’s Cuban Ghetto"

Abstract

The article discusses the ‘food voice’ as a substitute for verbal communication in the memoir Leaving Little Havana. A Memoir of Miami’s Cuban Ghetto by Cecilia M. Fernandez (2013). The culinary landscape of the memoir is examined through the anthropological perspective as the foodscape overlaps with the diasporic experience of the protagonists. Foodways show how Cuban identity is constructed in response to social and political developments. The geography of the memoir determines foodscapes by fusing Cuban cuisine with American regional cooking styles. The literary portrayal shows Cubans’ flexible attitude towards acculturation as their Floribbean cuisine maintains continuity with Caribbean cooking styles but, at the same time, it presents readiness to embrace new ingredients available in Florida. The emerging new food culture indicates the formation of complex hybrid identities.