Eating, sharing, and mutuality of being among the mentawai on Siberut Island, Indonesia.
This article examines the importance of sharing and eating in constructing personhood, reproducing social institutions, and reenacting social value. Based on 18 months of fieldwork among the Indigenous Mentawai living on Siberut Island (Indonesia), it examines eating and sharing that hint at food's...
| Published in: | Food, Culture & Society Vol. 28; no. 3; pp. 546 - 573 |
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| Format: | Article |
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Taylor & Francis Ltd
Jun2025
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=185256848&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 185256848 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 15528014 1GVA jtl: Food, Culture & Society issn: 15528014 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jun2025 vid: 28 iid: 3 pid: 377 pub: Taylor & Francis Ltd artinfo: ui: 185256848 10.1080/15528014.2024.2359773 ppf: 546 ppct: 27 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 19.7MB tig: atl: Eating, sharing, and mutuality of being among the mentawai on Siberut Island, Indonesia. aug: au: Darmanto, Darmanto affil: The Oriental Institute, Czech Academy of Science, Prague 8, Česká republika su: Social values Social institutions Mutualism Kinship Ingestion sug: subj: Social values Social institutions Mutualism Kinship Ingestion keyword: eating Food more-than-human mutuality sharing the Mentawai value eating Food more-than-human mutuality sharing the Mentawai value ab: This article examines the importance of sharing and eating in constructing personhood, reproducing social institutions, and reenacting social value. Based on 18 months of fieldwork among the Indigenous Mentawai living on Siberut Island (Indonesia), it examines eating and sharing that hint at food's importance in the Mentawai's idea of family, kinship, and mutuality. Eating and sharing food are not merely digestive activities; they constitute a process whereby the Mentawai redefine and remake their mutuality with others. At once material, moral, affective, and symbolic, Mentawai sharing and eating reveals how nourishment is shaped not just by food materiality or mode of livelihood but also by how they develop creative social relations with non-human entities. I argue that it is only by pursuing the Mentawai's mode of thinking and relating with more-than-human beings that one may understand the centrality of sharing in bringing humans and non-human persons together in a shared world. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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