ISSN: 2167-0269
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Research - (2019)Volume 8, Issue 2
Limited research examined the factors and attributes of festivals or events that affect the transmission of traditional cuisine. This study aims to conduct the transmission ways of traditional cuisine relations not only how the traditional cuisine exists and transfer from generation to generation by a review. Traditional cuisines are a part of life and culture, especially they are the spotlight at specific occasions, celebrations, or festivals, and improve the development and sustainability of tourism in rural destinations. The implications of this paper can be useful for promoting stakeholders’ implementations of traditional cuisines and providing to transmit traditional cuisines sustainably.
Traditional cuisines; Tourism attractions; Culture; Festivals/ Events; Stakeholders’ implementation
Recently, traditional cuisine is a key manifestation of a tourism’s intangible heritage, and tourists can receive a really cultural experience by the consumption [1], it also develops the relationships between tourists, destinations and local food cultures [2]. Traditional cuisine preserving the traditional culture and heritage of a particular areas’ people in countries is not the only thing about eating food, but also being known as representing regional identity [3,4], valuable image, specific meaning for religions, culture, and traditions of eating behavior. Different cuisines convey different meanings among the food consumers and reveal the closeness of the relationship for individuals, community residents, religious or ethnic groups [5]. Traditional cuisine improves not only destination attraction and branding identity for raising destination tourism, but also the development and prosperity of local economy [6].
Taiwan gathered Chinese north cuisines, Shandong pasta, Zhejiang, Sichuan and Cantonese cuisines, and even Mongolian barbecue after 1949 [7]. Chinese flourishing dining culture can be treated as a result of multi-cultural interaction [8]. Chinese People always have to eat traditional cuisine in many festivals or events. For example, Chinese eat rich reunion-dinner, Nian-Gao, and radish rice cake on the lunar New Year Eve, Yuan-Xiao on the Lantern Festival, Zong-Zi on Dragon Boat Festival, and moon cake on Mid- Autumn Festival. Family hospitality is a kind of social events, not only affords food and gathers families, but also is a key point to bond in the family as cultural bridge to transmit valued knowledge. However, family situations and family cuisine backgrounds will influence family members to eat traditional cuisine [9] and remark regional identity [3,4], such as valuable image, specific meaning for religions, culture, and traditions of eating behavior.
According to “Visitors survey of consumption and trends to Taiwan in 2015” of Taiwan Tourism Bureau [9] indicated that scenery and cuisine are two of main factors to attract foreign tourists to visit Taiwan. Understanding traditional cuisine or local food can attract food-interested tourists [10-12], every country promotes international completion of destination tourism through unique gourmet. Researchers have reported that one of the representations for national culture, history, destination identity, and image is food [13-17], therefore, every country intends to protect their own traditional cuisine because it is an inheritance to become the core identity of the country [18]. Moreover, its knowledge and skills gained by depending on personal experience and old-timers’ directions through learning procedures are cherished in building traditional culture between families [19].
Chambers [19] remarked that traditional cultural characteristics of tourism destinations are transmitted by festivals and delivered emotion, authenticity, and local image to visitors. According to the group of travelers may travel far or near to primarily seek for food experience [20,21]. The purposes of having festivals for the reason s of religious aims, celebrating social activities, or harvests, and leisure events, are not only for economic benefits, but also social benefits [22,23].
Nowadays, traditional cuisine has been recognized to be one of destination attractions. Without destination attraction, tourism industry will not be able to develop successfully [24]. Regular tourism destinations may no longer attract tourists anymore, in our rapidly changeable sociality, the group of travelers may travel far or near to primarily seek for food experience [21], fast food and traditional cuisine are really in opposite position, but are both impressed tourists meaningfully [25].
Exotic Foods changed the position of traditional cultures [26], such as the changes of social cultures, lifestyles and dietary habits, modern cooking utensils, and commercialized food are the reasons for the heritage barriers of traditional cuisines. Traditional cuisine is now facing a severe competition from commercially processed foods like fast foods and globalization of food products are the factors to influence the consumption behavior of traditional dishes [27-29], the ingredients of traditional cuisines are difficult to be got because of the seasons and product locations, the complicated working skills, and no old-timers to teach younger generations, rare young people can make it in Taiwan.
Previous studies of tourism applications are for cuisine tourism or festival/ event tourism, not for traditional cuisine transmission of festivals [25]. Authentic information on methods of preparation and nutritional qualities of traditional recipes is being lacked. The substitution of traditional foods not only led to a loss of production of traditionally and culturally appropriate food, but also in the loss of traditional knowledge related to food production. It created serious health and socio-economic problems among community members [30]. Despite growing researches on festival tourism or traditional cuisine tourism, very limited research examined the factors and attributes of festivals or events that affect the transmission of traditional cuisine. This study aims to conduct the transmission ways of traditional cuisine relations not only how the traditional cuisine exists and transfer from generation to generation by a review.
Local food at any destination is what essentially constitutes food tourism attractions, as the gateway to the culture of that particular region. Consumers are always attracted to such places, which presents an opportunity for them to indulge in that particular culture. Traditional cuisine plays a remarkable role in culture [31], gastronomy heritage, and status, and improves the development and sustainability of tourism in rural destinations [32]. Every country intends to protect their own traditional cuisine because it is an inheritance to become the core identity of the country, and its knowledge and skills are cherished in building traditional culture between families. Traditional cuisine creates a cohesive culinary identity as an iconic foods for countries that could be like Japan’s sushi, Korea’s kimchi, or Italy’s pizza- an instantly recognizable icon” [33].
Traditional cuisine is defined as a part of life and culture [34], a set of tradition with being linked to a territory [35], a representation of a group, and at least twenty-five years; it’s also something eaten frequently, commonly, or seasonally, especially at specific occasions, celebrations, or festivals [34], a representation of perspectives and as something eaten frequently, commonly, or seasonally, especially at specific occasions, celebrations, or festivals [34]. Traditional food must also be homemade or made by artisans and must be transmitted from one generation to another. The processing of both the raw materials and traditional food products should be performed locally [36].
Due to diversify the food consumption, Timmer et al. [36] explained that: Governments collect the efforts to influence the social target throughout the decision-making situations of food consumers, food producers, and food market agent. Although simple skills and processes are used to make traditional local foods, they are high-quality products, and these handmade foods are intended for celebrations representing the local culture [14].
Because of sociality changes, the symbolic meaning of diet is against traditional customs, and more and more tourists travel for diets [37-40]. As eating habit is a part of culture, it can show difference among every society. The concept of cuisine as food, different kind of food and beverages, preparing, cooking, servicing, storing, process of consuming foods. Eating cuisine combines with tourism and understanding the culture background of their areas and nations improve both relations increasingly, for instance, diet plays a role to represent same or different culture by selling food products as souvenirs to tourists in rural tourism or festival tourisms [41]. Many countries or cities are eager to attract tourists by promoting distinct local cuisine [11]. Horng and Tsai [30] indicated that countries in Asia including Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand create official websites to offer information about their own traditional cuisine and representative food.
As part of the tourist experience, eating local cuisine is a way of breaking with standardized, everyday routine by taking the tourists off into unknown culinary realms. Definitions of cuisine tourism and gastronomic tourism explicitly mention food as an important or primary motivational factor for travel of tourists with interest in food. Food tourism can be considered as a subset of cultural tourism and to learn through an experience about a previously unknown or very specific culture and environment [42]. Therefore, one contribution of food is to provide tourists a greater experience. Cuisine tourists travelling to the destinations are generally considered to be significantly influenced by savoring local specialty. However, the decision to undertake destination activities such as participation in local cuisine festivals might not be a consideration when tourists make their decision to travel [43,44]. Therefore, there is some disagreement when food becomes an important or primary motivational factor in tourists’ decision making [45].
Moreover, traditional gastronomy is described as a kind of culture, emotion, hospitality, prestige and power, it also improves the places of people’s origin. Every local cuisine presents the core performance of a destination’s intangible heritage, and by experiencing the cuisine, tourists can obtain a genuinely authentic cultural experience [1,36]. Therefore, traditional local foods hold the potential to bind and stabilize communities and enable a cultural continuity through conserving their histories.
Although simple skills and processes are used to make traditional local foods, they are high-quality products, and these handmade foods are intended for celebrations representing the local culture [14]. Hence, every local cuisine presents the core performance of a destination’s intangible inheritance, and through tasting the cuisine, tourists can obtain a genuinely authentic cultural experience [1,36]. Traditional cuisine is represented as a wide spectrum of food cultures with distinctive regional differences and preferences. Therefore, loss of traditional knowledge and skills related to food production may lead to extinction of nutritional food products as well as skills gained through generations.
Diet is impacted by tribe movement, and government policies, the national trends also highly influenced as well. Gastronomy tourism of each destination should differentiate itself by highlighting its unique tangible and intangible products and services. Developing traditional cuisine could improve the tourism attraction, which is often the basis for tourists to choose their own destinations [46], which play an important role for the first time visitors to visit [47]. Traditional cuisine related tourism can allow tourists to reach desired goals of relaxation, excitement, escapism, status, education and lifestyle.
Traditional cuisine is also agricultural food, a property of destination residents, culture dimensions, and destination tradition to ensure the succession [35] broadly transferred cuisine knowledge and skills from generation to generation often [48], such as Japanese believe that sushi is one of their unique cuisine [49], and kimchi represents Korea ethnic food [50].
Accordingly, human dining behaviors of cuisine, food consumption and personal traits which are cued by foods, the social and physical settings, and individuals, are impacted by and related to individuals’ feelings [51]. Some young people know about their traditional foods by ethic festivals. The elder generations know the cultural cognitive knowledge of festival cuisines and customs more than the younger generations. Knowledge about cultural or societal practices is primarily transmitted in a non-verbal way. Human internalized and embody implicit knowledge as so-called habits and acquire explicit knowledge during their lifetime, the knowledge of Traditional cuisine involves the skills, preparation procedure, and producing methods.
Knowledge transmission concerning food through individual alters is crucial. In subsistence societies in particular, children learn most of their knowledge about their natural environment, notably ethnology knowledge, during childhood. It is perceived as a valuable resource for children to connect with their cultural roots. Knowledge can be shared by members of a group, but its distribution is influenced by factors such as sex, age, relationship and employment [52].
Based on these results, traditional cuisine expenditure during festival tourism is an important factor in whether or not tourists plan to revisit an area and recommend it to others. It also shows that more tourists can be attracted if festivals are well suited to local conditions and characteristics such as the availability of seafood in the example examined in this work [53].
Recently, festival tourism has been one of the attractively favorable marketing ways to attract tourists to consume items around the destinations [53]. In the other words, festivals are used as instruments for improving tourism and the regional economy, and they are one type of cultural events and are traveling attractions with special features. Festivals and the special events have always been important resources for tourism, they could help in promoting social cohesion and reproducing social relations [54]. On the other hand, the rising literature in festivals and special event tourism has increasingly attracted more and more event-goers [55]. For instance, there are three emerging festivals, namely artistic and cultural festival, industry promotion and community-based festival, and innovation inheritance and folk Festival [54]. In order to promote regional prosperity, constant investment, advertising and promotion to attract tourists, and governments have always been the most important resource for tourism development.
Many researches related to festival tourism in academic literature focus on artistic and cultural festival [56-57], industry promotion [58], and community-based festival [59-64]. Traditional festivals, religious activities, indigenous ceremonies, Hakka cultural activities, and specially industry activities were the classification in Taiwan [65]. A variety of festivals and the special events have been important resources and are one of the growing tourism attractions and styles [66]. Festivals provide opportunities to communities for economic benefits and destination marketing for social and cultural benefits [67]. The range of festivals includes culture, religious celebration, national commemoration days, product promotion, and neighborhood celebrations [68]. On the other hand, festivals can promote discussing art, identity, imagery, economy, and destinations of politics, they also make money and headlines of the sites. The promotion of festivals can afford opportunities to increasingly share the culture, environment of towns, villages and cities keen to share with visitors [69].
The definition of festival tourism includes combining the theme of a festival with the local distinguishing features of areas. Generally, a themed festival has an opened celebration with leisure and cultural opportunities like as shows, film, food, music, harvest celebrations, and farm products [66]. In the development of festive tourism, festivals are not like as simple performances or folk festivals in the past. They did not contain any profitable purposes or benefit, on the other hand, festivals have become the new trend of tourism. Moreover, attendees are interested in experiencing funny, exciting and pleasing festivals [70]. Many researches worldwide highlight festival tourism impacts [71-73]. Having festivals is the best way to protect local historical cultures and social heritages [40], many scholars indicated that developing festivals brings cultural, economic, social and financial benefits to rural areas or communities [74-79].
Some studies indicated that traditional cuisine festivals can combine between destinations, culture, identity, and the brand image of gastronomy. One way to display their culture or specialties and present the sense of identity to visitors is to take place festivals [80-82]. Moreover, it confirmed that traditional cuisine events improve on the brand of destinations [83]. Getz [65] pointed out that “communities without ancient traditions and festivals to celebrate are often motivated to create them for the purpose of establishing traditions and providing a sense of roots.” Considering the decision-making process of the festival goers’ can be differed into five stages, including anticipation to a festival, moving towards the festival site, on-site of the festival, returning home, and recollection of experiences [85], the intended participants must meet their needs and be satisfied with the festivals or special events, they would revisit them [62], that is, festival satisfaction promotes tourists to increasingly attend the activities.
Here is a need for knowledge transmission of traditional cuisine to find the concepts and frameworks and understand processes usefully whether it involved both a way to link individuals and their attitudes to the sociality context where they live and engage, and an understanding of the link between knowledge transmission of traditional cuisine and festivals.
Social representations theory is defined as a theory of social knowledge with common senses, a specific way of understanding, and communicating for social interactions what we know already [84-86], offers a framework to examine the complication and movement included in stakeholders’ interactions in knowledge transmission of traditional cuisine context of festivals, allow groups to construct and share a common social reality [87], and furnish directions to individuals for how to deal with the situations [88]. It is also a theory of sharing with critical analyses of phenomenon representations through the argument, that is, social representations are created through social interaction with the aim of assisting in social communication [86]. It contends that people do not develop their understanding and representation of reality individually but instead through the process of representations.
Moreover, individuals and groups incorporate shared representations of reality in the process derived from social thinking and collective communications into the cognitive system in which reality is reconstructed to reflect the values, norms, and identity to which they subscribe [89,90]. Representations are created via social practices, and are appropriated and reconstructed by individuals to serve as an interpretation system that informs relations with their environment and guide their own beliefs, ideas, expectations, attitudes, and subsequent actions [89]. Basically, SR theory provides “what people mean as they engage in the task of making sense of the world in which they live and communicate with others about it” [91]. Social representations are created through two processes namely anchoring and objectification [85]. For instance, the process to find a real experience is anchoring, it means anchoring that to adopt or avoid the ways of knowledge transmission offered for traditional cuisine. The key concept is developed to associate with a concrete visual image is named objectification [85]. To sum up, social representations theory provides a specific framework to conduct common process which not only reflects community residents’ cognition of surrounding environment, but also directs residents’ behaviors to form place identity.
“Stakeholder” was defined a stakeholder in an organization as “any group or individual who can affect or is affected by the achievement of the organization’s objectives”, and management context, many groups or individuals who can affect or are affected by the achievement of organizational goals. Various individuals or groups who support or the influence of the organizations, and are reciprocally supported or influenced in any organizational situation [91]. Stakeholder theory applied to tourism industries, predicates that notice cautiously all people who affect or are affected by consequence of objectives for tourism development is also instrumental [91].
The stakeholder's perception is going to be achieved by means of a participative process to include those aspects considered relevant to influence the factors in the transmission of traditional cuisine, to ensure the involvement of factors to create ethnic, fair, and successful relationships between organizations, individuals, and networks of the stakeholders. Stakeholder relationships are built on organizational identity. Stakeholders are classified functionally as owners, consumer advocates, customers, competitors, media, employees, special interest groups, suppliers, governments, and business organizations. They defined primary stakeholders include employees, volunteers, sponsors, suppliers, attendees, participants, and spectators, the second stakeholders involve governments, host communities, emergency services, general business, media and tourism organizations.
Traditional cuisines are a part of life and culture, especially they are the spotlight at specific occasions, celebrations, or festivals, and improve the development and sustainability of tourism in rural destinations. Therefore, governments focus on protecting the transmission of their own traditional cuisines in order to attract tourists, specially, the knowledge and skills are cherished in building traditional culture between families and tourism. Traditional cuisines become the core identity of the country and tourism attraction. Festival/ event tourism is one of the attractively marketing ways to attract tourists to consume souvenirs around the destinations. They are used to not only improve the sustainable tourism but also regional economy.
Social representations theory provides a conduct-commonprocess framework to reflect community residents’ cognition of surrounding environment, and directs residents’ behaviors to form place identity. The stakeholder's perceptions is relevant to influence the factors in the transmission of traditional cuisine. The stakeholders do the efforts to attract more and more tourists who are interested in festivals, special event tourism, and traditional cuisines.
Citation: Lin HY (2019) The Transmission of Traditional Cuisines: A Review. J Tourism Hospit 8:2.
Received: 05-Mar-2019 Accepted: 15-Apr-2019 Published: 25-Apr-2019 , DOI: 10.35248/2167-0269.19.8.400
Copyright: © 2019 Lin HY. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.