Douglas E. Ross

Factors Influencing the Dining Habits of Japanese and Chinese Migrants at a British Columbia Salmon Cannery

Little archaeological research has focused on comparing the lives of Chinese migrants in North America with their non-Chinese neighbors, and only a modest amount of work of any sort has been done on Japanese sites. The following study compares archaeological and archival evidence of dining habits among Japanese and Chinese laborers at a turn-of-the-20thcentury salmon cannery in British Columbia. The objective is to explore the role of ethnic tradition and contextual factors in patterns of material consumption, using a theoretical perspective rooted in transnationalism and diaspora. Results indicate the Japanese cannery workers consumed a combination of Asian- and Western-style meals, while the Chinese relied largely on traditional meals. Data from these and other sites reveal considerable diversity, however, and demonstrate that labor organization and other contextual factors are at least equally as important as cultural tradition in producing distinctions between consumption patterns of Asian migrant groups.