Introduction Many immigrant families bring with them the foods of their home country and are ready to share them with their children and future generations. However, some do not get the chance to do so as they are pressured to give up their foods for “healthier” and more American dishes. This stems from the ongoing problem of assimilation that has plagued America since the decimation of Native Americans. Nutritionists will make the claim that a great majority of the foods that immigrants from the Caribbean and Latin America are unhealthy and is the cause for chronic disease in immigrants . Asking them to replace their foods is not saying they should replace ingredients but simply switch to a more Americanized meal instead. Food is a gateway that Americans use to pressure immigrants into assimilation. The pressure to assimilate into American culture may be a source of spikes in immigrant health complications; not because the foods themselves are unhealthy. Statistics on Immigrant Health It should be made …show more content…
This is not a new trend. Many times immigrants will take the old style recipes from their home land make them with what they can find in America. The abundance of resources allows them to create foods that are similar in taste but not in calories or fat content. Another aspect of this Americanization is the style of cooking. Many Haitian immigrants will not cut out the fat or take the skin off chicken before they feed it to their families. However, in Haiti the removal is a standard practice . This would make the food fattier and unhealthier than if it were cooked in Haiti. In Haiti, frying food was something done sparingly but is a common American practice . Although it is the immigrants themselves that make the changes in their food, these choices are not made consciously. Assimilation is something that, when done indirectly, seeps into the mind and changes the people
In recent studies, it was discovered that most of the foods that Americans consumed are foods which had gone through so many processes and thereby losing most of its nutritional values. Unhealthy nutrients are also been added to foods as additive during production to either preserve flavor or enhance its taste and appearance. An individual cannot simply trust what he or she is consuming at a fast food restaurant or even a cheap prepared meal at a grocery store. Processed food or western diet needs to be replaced and totally taken out of the American life and diet; this will help the Americans to live a healthier life, and spend less on medical bills.
In his essay “The American Paradox”, Michael Pollan illustrates his conclusion that Americans who focus on nutrition have a higher probability of decreasing their well-being. Pollan defines the American paradox as “a notably unhealthy population preoccupied with nutrition and the idea of eating healthily.” For most of our human history, our parents and culture have influenced our diet. However, today the idea of what to eat has been based on the opinions of scientists, food markets, and nutritionists. I agree with Pollan’s argument that being preoccupied with what we eat makes us unhealthy, however, we need a balance and a sense of responsibility in what we eat.
More and more health-conscious individuals are scrutinizing the source of the food their family consumes. However, even the most conscientious consumer is not fully aware of the exhaustive efforts and struggle to get a juicy, ripe strawberry or that plump tomato in the middle of winter, even in Florida. These foods are harvested and picked mostly by seasonal and migrant farm workers. Migrant workers hail, in large part, from Mexico and the Caribbean, and their families often travel with them. Migrant farm workers must endure challenging conditions so that Americans can have the beautiful selection of berries, tomatoes, and other fresh foods often found at places like a farmer’s market or a traditional super market. Seasonal and migrant farm workers suffer a variety of health problems as a result of their constant exposure to stress, the elements, and chemicals such as pesticides. They are paid minimal wages and are expected to work long hours of strenuous labor for pennies on the dollar per piece or per hour. The migrant families are expected to live in substandard quarters and transported to various work sites in unsafe transportation. The fresh fruits and vegetables consumers purchase with little thought reach supermarkets at a cost that is not reflected in the retail price. This cost is ultimately absorbed by farm workers in Florida and other areas throughout the country, who are among the poorest of American workers.
Food insecurity is one of the major social problems that we have in our world today. The concern about this problem is the increasing number of people that are beginning to experience hunger more often. “While hunger has long been a public health concern in developing countries, it has received varying degrees of attention in the United States, most notable during the 1930s and 1960s” (Poppendieck 1992). In addition to lack of food, there are consequences that follow. People, especially children, who suffer from food deprivation also undergo some health issues such as malnutrition and obesity, which leads to more health care and hospitalizations. “In the early 1980s, most reports of hunger involved families with children, the elderly, the unskilled and unemployed youth, the mentally ill, the homeless and minorities” (Brown 1992; Nestle and Guttmacher 1992). However, a particular ethnic group that is greatly affected by food insecurities are the Hispanic...
The study addresses the impact of dietary acculturation on the rates of obesity among the migrant communities in Logan, South-East Queensland. Dietary acculturation is a result of migration and involves the adoption of nutritional behaviours and dietary practices of the host countries by the migrants (1). It has been associated with an increased incidence of obesity and diabetes among the migrants. (2). This study looks at the information nutrition needs of African and Pacific Islander communities in Logan.
Nutrition is an important aspect affecting the Hispanics health. Hispanic foods vary depending on their countries of origin but main ones include, rice, beans, and tortillas. Lard is used to prepare the food. On the other hand, assimilation and acculturation has led to changes in the traditional Hispanic diets, making processed and fast food more common. Fast foods both American style such as hamburgers and Mexican such as tacos de fajita are enjoyed by many(De Paula, Lagana & Gonzalez-Ramirez,2009).This has resulted to obesity being a major problem for the Hispanic population. This h...
Forty-eight percent of individuals who cooked dinner six to seven times a week consumed 2,164 calories, 81 grams of fat and 119 grams of sugar daily. They were also able to conclude that those who consumed home-cooked meals depend less on frozen foods and are less likely to choose fast foods. However, as explained in, “Tasting food, tasting freedom: excursions into eating, culture, and the past” Sidney Mintz explains in chapter eight that the majority of Americans often choose to eat out at fast food joints because of the convenience of these meals. Mintz states that these meals are usually diets, “high in animal protein, salts, fats, and processed sugars, low in fresh fruits and vegetables, drinking more soda than tap water.” This is where cultural, and social aspects create conflict when attempting to switch to this healthier lifestyle (although it is feasible). Depending on an individual’s schedule, it will either be an easier switch to make home-cooked meals, or just another difficult task to accomplish throughout the
Nutritionism is an ideology that believes that the nutrients in foods are the key to understanding them. Nutritionism believers are so focused on the nutrients that food contains that they forget about all other aspects of food. The problem is that consumers rely on packaging to tell them what nutrients a food provides, since nutrients cannot be obviously seen, and they rely on science to tell us what nutrients are good and which are “evil”.
Nowadays, people are giving more importance to food labels than ever before. The variety of terms and definitions is overwhelming, organic, transgenic, non GMO, processed food, just to name a few. Considering all the available media information, it should not be such complicated decision. The message remains the same, organic food is good, and transgenic food is not. However, is organic food really the best option? On the other hand, is transgenic food really dangerous? What are the scientific studies supporting these facts?
The United States is often referred to as a melting pot since it is made up of people from different cultures. Individuals might differ in their skin color, ethnicity, and beliefs, but we are united by various factors, including food. With immigrants coming to the United States from all over the world, Americans are exposed to new cuisines. As these cuisines spread across the country becoming more and more popular, Americans develop a strong liking towards them, which affects the growth of the economy. For example, the increased number of Asian immigrants exposes more Americans to various Asian cuisines and causes the number of Asian restaurants to “[mushroom] and the variety of cuisines [to multiply]” (Yang 169). The proliferation of ethnic restaurants has flourished the economy, and Chinese restaurants alone produce “$17 billion in annual sales” (Yang 170). But the introduction of new cultures and cuisines transforms the unhealthy American lifestyle into a nutritious one. Since countries around the world have healthier staple foods and rely on “grains, vegetables, and fruits rather than meat and dairy products,” they have decreased rates of health implications like obesity, diabetes, and high blood pressure, which are all prevalent in America (Yang 170). When more Americans make the
Nutrition and health have become more popular in today 's society. Our generation is becoming more and more indebted to the idea of being healthy and eating nutritious meals. However, in “The American Paradox,” by Michael Pollan he argues that our unhealthy population is preoccupied with nutrition and the idea of eating healthy than their actual health. He also mentions the food industry, nutrition science and how culture affects the way we eat and make food choices. While Pollan is right about all these factor that affect our eating habits, there is more to it than that. Convenience, affordability and social influence also affects our food choices making them inadequate.
America is a capitalist society. It should come to a surprise when we live like this daily. We work for profit. We’ll buy either for pleasure or to sell later for profit. It should come to no surprise that our food is made the same way because we are what we eat. We are capitalist that eat a capitalist meal. So we must question our politics. Is our government system to blame for accepting and encouraging monopolies?
Many people in America, from toddlers to the elderly, have shown numerous signs of bad health. People have the desire to keep on eating due to more, new things being merchandised as “new and improved items” from the producers. For example, nowadays, people are eating pure junk that they find satisfying on the grocery food shelf. As, stated by Michael Pollan, in his article, “Eat Food: Food Defined” he affirmed that “real food is the type of things that our
Foods from Africa, which have impacted North American cuisine are numerous, and common in the everyday eating habits of Americans. In the 21st century, Americans take for granted the history of the food they eat, and the origins of the foods that are eaten today. In the early part of the history of the United States, people of European descent brought recipes from home and adapted their recipes to the ingredients which were available. The slave trade was directly responsible for what many Americans think of as American food, and those foods are traceable to Africa. Because slaves incorporated their own foods into the everyday lives of their masters, some of the unique foods from Africa and their history are not well known today. American
One of the chief causes is unhealthy diets. On one hand, there are high-calorie foods in daily diets like chocolates, sugar, cheese and butter. Teenagers eat more and more high-fat burgers and pizza in fast food restaurants. For example, according to Altman and Leitch (2012), in Mexico, students drink cola rather than water due to the short of hygienic drinking water. Coca cola made agreements with many schools that they would exclusively sell Coca cola inside the schools. Therefore, Mexicans are considering being the most obese country which will have 70% overweight people including 30% obsess in the future. (Altman and Leitch,2012). The foods most commonly eaten by over 80% of kids are white bread, savoury snacks, chips, biscuits and chocolate confectionery. Besides, almost 20% kids do not eat any fruit at all. In general, kids eat about half the recommended five portions of fruit and vegetables a day. On the other hand, some people judge traditional food healthier; however, some traditional foods are extremely oily as well. For example, Chinese pay attention to use oil to heat the ingredients quickly. This makes the food fairly oily and high-fat. Furthermore, diets today are changing according to ...