LUDWIG-MAXIMILIANS-UNIVERSITÄT MÜNCHEN
A THESIS SUBMITTED TO FAKULTÄT FÜR SPRACH- UND LITERATURWISSENSCHAFTEN IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF MAGISTER ARTIUM M.A.

AMERICAN INFLUENCE ON FILIPINO FOOD CULTURE – A CASE STUDY

BY PHILIPP M. KLEINFELDER
2004

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ... i

List of Tables ... ii

Chapter

1. Introduction: Theory and Method ... 1

2. American Influence in East Asia ... 14

3. McDonald’s in East Asia — The Philippine Example ... 23
3.1. Traditional Fast Food in the Philippines ... 23
3.2. McDonald’s Enters the Philippines ... 30
3.3. Jollibee and McDonald’s Today ... 33
3.4. Jollibee and the McDonald’s System ... 36
3.5. Fast Food Marketing and Filipino Values ... 40
3.6. Jollibee, McDonald’s, and the Philippine Consumers ... 60
3.7. Taste – Standardization and Adjustment ... 77
3.8. Bread, Rice, and Filipino Politics ... 81
3.9. Consumption Patterns: Rice vs. Wheat ... 89

4. Findings and Conclusion ... 97

Bibliography ... 101

Books and Academic Articles ... 101

Newspaper, Magazine, and Periodical Articles ... 106

Philippine Cookbooks ... 113

Appendix in Separate Volume

1. Introduction: Theory and Method

“Everyone is into fusion now. Interior designers, fashion, food, everything is so fused, no?”(A Filipino Chef. 28 October 2003)

Two central concepts are relevant to define for the topic of this thesis. Firstly, the connection of food and culture needs to be clarified. How significant is food in the realm of culture? What cultural characteristics can be examined through the study of food? Secondly, the notion of cultural influence needs to be resolved. What determines cultural influence? What effects does the process of cultural influence have?

Food, Culture, and Identity

Food is a day-to-day activity that involves every human being. Daily nutrition intake is essential to keep the vital body functions intact and is therefore a biological necessity. But food is more than that. Unlike animals, human beings transcended the stage in which instincts of survival determine the action of satisfying hunger. Food is bought, prepared, and consumed in every society around the globe. Food is not only basic principle of every economy, the activities around food have created a tremendous spectrum of different ways and meanings amongst all the peoples of the world. This makes food a particularly interesting topic for cultural anthropologists, as Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik conclude, “food is life, and life can be studied and understood through food.”¹ Indeed, food as subject is of such interest that Alan Davidson recently published the extensive reference work “Oxford Companion to Food.”²
According to anthropologist Ulrich Tolksdorf, the ways and meanings created by humans in-between hunger and its satisfaction are connected in a rather complex manner.³ Following Talcott Parsons’ system theory, he understands food as open cultural system. This system is constituted of two main parts, the culinary system around the kitchen, and the system of human action in which individuals and groups communicate and interact with each other. In Tolksdorf’s opinion, the importance of this cultural system becomes clear by looking at the enculturation process. A human being is influenced by skills, norms, values, and tastes. Table manners, food practices, and spices educate and form children already during a very early stage of life. According to Tolksdorf, the impact of the cultural system of food is actually more significant than influences of other cultural systems:
Das Ernährungssystem [ist] viel stärker während des Enkulturationsprozesses in der kulturalen Persönlichkeit verankert … als andere kulturelle Systeme (wie z.B. Sprache, Kleidung, Brauchformen usw.).⁴

The deeply rooted connection of food and culture is also observed in another peculiar characteristic.
Although the cultural system of food is a subsystem of the general social system of a society, the mechanisms of food as a social system are neither functionally connected to, nor do they reflect the general social system. As Tolksdorf found out, the cultural system of food is characterized by a “cultural drift,” and thus follows rules determined within the system itself. Changes within society such as industrialization and urbanization, for example, do not directly affect food and food behavior of the people.⁵ In contrast, other aspects of material culture such as clothing, housing or means of transportation, have been certainly more affected by industrialization and urbanization. Due to the enculturation process, Tolksdorf argues further, a strong affinity to learned food ways and acquired tastes is formed which is often referred to as “taste conservatism.” This concepts is encountered all over the world and explains, for instance, why German tourists end up craving for their bread and beer during vacations in Italy, and Filipino overseas workers often try to smuggle some bottles of their native shrimp paste bagoong through American and Middle Eastern customs. The adherence to familiar nourishments can also be observed in the process of immigration, as Harvey Levenstein and Stephen Mennell show for the example of European immigrants to the United States (US). ⁶
Besides the importance of food in the socialization process of the individual, food is also significant in the formation of group identities. In “We Are What We Eat,” Donna R. Gabacci identifies food habits “as concrete symbols of human culture and identity”⁷ and shows how certain foodstuffs and particularly food ways have constituted ethnic and regional identities as well as a national identity in the US. The significance of food and group identity was already mentioned by Russian ethnographer S.A. Tokarev. According to Tokarev, food not only connects people through collective eating, but also segregates them.⁸ Food taboos, for example, are encountered in religious contexts, Hindus do not eat beef, Muslims and Jews do not eat pork.⁹ Further, and for this study also of relevance, Pierre Bourdieu shows how taste correlates with social class and determines its affiliation.¹⁰
The study of food in conjunction with group identity is particularly interesting for the topic of this thesis. Since an “American” influence on “Filipino” food culture is examined, the link of food and national identity is of importance. In the formation of a national food culture, the concept of “national dishes” has been of special interest. Eszter Kisbán, for example, found out for the case of Hungary that sauerkraut with meat has played an important role for the construction of a “Hungarian” national identity, whereas the stereotypical dish goulash only characterizes a region.¹¹ However, an American influence on Philippine “national dishes” is not analyzed, because regional and ethnic culinary influences seem more significant than foreign influences here.
Another very important concept in the study of food was introduced by anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss. According to Lévi-Strauss, food of the “endo-cuisine” is prepared within the domestic sphere and “destined to a small closed group,”¹² such as the family. On the other hand, food prepared in the “exo-cuisine” is meant for public consumption and is, for instance, offered to guests. In his attempt to determine norms that are generally applicable in the social world of cooking, Lévi-Strauss particularly focuses on cooking methods and associates boiling as a method closely connected with the “endo-cuisine,” whereas roasting is mostly used in the “exo-cuisine.” In Tolksdorf’s opinion, Lévi-Strauss’ structural differentiation emphasizes more on the analysis of universally valid conditions of the human mind rather than concrete effects of food in social relations.¹³ Thus, Tolksdorf correlates Lévi-Strauss’ definition with the idea of Tokarev who equates the opposition of family and social environment with the distinction of home and outside of the home.¹⁴ This approach narrows the broad idea of Lévi-Strauss’ concept down to the distinction of meals prepared for domestic day-to-day consumption and meals eaten at special occasions and in restaurants. For ethnologist Klaus Roth, this definition of “endo-cuisine” and “exo-cuisine” also helps to analyze the stages of indigenization of foreign nourishments into local cuisines. According to Roth, new and exotic dishes are usually at first encountered in the “exo-cuisine” while adoptions in the “endo-cuisine” are strongly adjusted to the local palate and occur much slower.¹⁵
Therefore, this study focuses especially on the “exo-cuisine,” food consumed outside home. Albeit influences on the “endo-cuisine” are signs for a deeper cultural impact, the “exo-cuisine” provides a field where a case of cultural influence might be more obvious.

[...]

1 Counihan, Carole, and Penny Van Esterik, eds., Food and Culture: A Reader (New York: Routledge, 1997), 1.
2 Davidson, Alan. The Oxford Companion to Food (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
3 Tolksdorf, Ulrich, “Strukturalistische Nahrungsforschung,” Ethnoligia Europaea 9 (1976):64-85.
4 Tolksdorf, Ulrich, “Nahrungsforschung,” in Grundriß der Volkskunde, edited by Rolf W. Brednich (Berlin: Reimer, 1988), 237. For a detailed psychological study on the enculturation process of food see  Capaldi, Elizabeth D., ed, Why We Eat What We Eat (Washington D.C.: American Psychological Association, 1996).
5 Teuteberg, Hans J., and Günter Wiegelmann, Der Wandel der Nahrungsgewohnheiten unter dem Einfluß der Industrialisierung (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1972). This example is used by Tolksdorf (1976).
6 Levenstein, Harvey, “The Food Habits of European Immigrants to America: Homogenization or Hegemonization?” in Essen und kulturelle Identität, edited by Hans J. Teuteberg et al. (Berlin: Akademie, 1997), 465-472; Mennell, Stephen, “The Culinary Culture of Europe Overseas,” in Hans J. Teuteberg et al. (1997), 459-464.
7 Gabbaci, Donna R., We Are What We Eat (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1998), 8.
8 Tokarev, S.A., “Von einigen Aufgaben der ethnographischen Erforschung der materiellen Kultur,” Ethnologia Europaea 6 (1972): 165-166.
9 Harris, Marvin, “The Abominable Pig,” in Carole Counihan and Penny van Esterik, 67-79.
10 Bourdieu, Pierre, Die feinen Unterschiede: Kritik der gesellschaftlichen Urteilskraft (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1982).
11 Kisbán, Eszter, “Dishes as Samples and Symbols: National and Ethnic Markers in Hungary,” in Hans J. Teuteberg et al. (1997), 204-211.
12 Lévi-Strauss, Claude, “The Culinary Triangle,” in Carole Counihan and Penny van Esterik, 30. The original publication is published as “Le triangle culinaire,” in L’Arc 26 (1965): 19-29.
13 Tolksdorf, “Strukturalistische Nahrungsforschung,” 73-74.
14 Tokarev, S.A., “Von einigen Aufgaben der ethnographischen Erforschung der materiellen Kultur,” 175.
15 Roth, Klaus, “Türkentrank, Gulyás, Joghurt, Döner: Stereotypen in der europäischen Esskultur,” in Vom Schwarzwald bis zum Schwarzen Meer, edited by Valeria Heuberger et al. (Frankfurt a.M.: Lang, 2001), 47.