Research Proposal on Japanese Food in Japan
Introduction
In December 2013, UNESCO added washoku, traditional dietary culture of the Japanese to the list of Intangible Cultural Heritage (Rath, 2016). Essential to the definition of washoku is the use of locally sourced ingredients and well as local cuisines which are often cited in the prime examples of washoku prompting to the diversity of Japanese food cultures. According to Ishige (2019), the efforts to describe the local food preferences through provincial inclusion are neither new nor unique to the world. However, the case in Japan, as demonstrated by numerous ethnographic studies undertaken before, left local food cultures surprisingly undefined except for the ways it is mobilized to support policy aims of the central government.
These ethnographic studies only reveal more about culinary boundaries on regional foods and how the central government superimposes them rather than how eating habit variations develop from the local culture and geography. Consequently, in the process of defining local food in japan, the conspicuous role of the central government only offers counterexamples to the cases in Italy and India. However, the opposite situation occurred in japan as the dominant definition of national cuisine modeled the meaning of the local food. The purpose of this research is to find out whether the definition of the local of the national cuisine shaped the meaning of the local Japanese food.
Literature review
In the literature, there are a few definitions of the concept of traditional food. Rath (2016) defines traditional food products as food representing a group, belongs to a specific space, and is a part of the culture that involves the collaboration of the people operating in that territory. For food to be categorized as traditional, the food must be linked to a territory and should also be part of set traditions while strive to ensure its continuity over time. Rural-based traditional food consumers in japan tend to prioritize on civic issues in food choice while exhibiting higher levels of concern over food provisioning as well as a great interest in local food.
Solid understanding of consumer’s feelings and wants highly depends on clear communication through a universal language. Therefore, there is a need to derive a consumer-based definition of traditional Japanese food and locally sourced ingredients in order to understand consumers’ attitude toward the traditional Japanese food and national cuisine (Defrancesco & Kimura, 2018). Typically, such feelings are associated with social, cultural aspects, which in turn may relate to the country or place of origin of the consumers. In general, Most cross-sectional researches show essential dissimilarities in traditional food-related aspects, even when related to the relatively homogenous country such as those belonging to Japan. Such dissimilarities are candid through both food choices and consumption patterns as well as lifestyles, attitudes, and beliefs.
Defrancesco and Kimura (2018) claim that locally sourced ingredients constitute an essential element of the Japanese food culture identity and heritage contributing to the development and sustainability of the rural areas, protecting them from depopulation enhancing substantial food differentiation for producers and processors and provide ample variety of food choices to consumers. Consumers often recognize locally sourced ingredients with characteristics linked to the sensory quality and regional identity (Stalker, 2018). The essential part of locally sourced ingredients is sold under different collective trademarks, including quality labels, and most of the time, consumers show a positive attitude toward these products. However, producers of locally sourced ingredients still face stiff competition to improve further the healthiness, safety, and convenience of their products
Research Methodology
The most efficient methodology to get preliminary insight into the concept underlying Japanese traditional food products, as well as the innovation on a consumer point of view for the research, will be trough a quantitative research technique, particularly by using focused group discussions. The focus group discussion is a methodology in which a small number of individuals are selected to obtain specific information about their reaction to a particular concept about the product. However, the main disadvantage of the quantitative research technique is the subjectivity of the information obtained. Therefore, it will require careful interpretation of the results obtained. To avoid this tendency of the analyst concentrating on what they want to see or hear and fits their expectations and ideas, various alternatives to the analyst’s subjective interpretation would be proposed to make the analysis more objective.
Data analysis
Transcription in word by word of each recording from each focus group will be made in the original Japanese language and then translated into English and the final cross-cultural report made. Each transcription obtained will split into three different text files, one for the concept of traditional Japanese food, one for locally sourced ingredients, and one for the definition of traditional Japanese food.
Conclusion
The main objective of the proposed research is to obtain a consumer-driven definition of Japanese Traditional food products, concepts of traditional Japanese food, and locally sourced ingredients. In order to make this quantitative methodological approach research more objective, a textual analysis will be applied to allow the comparison of the results obtained from the various focus group discussion.
References
Defrancesco, E., & Kimura, J. (2018). Are Geographical Indications (GIs) Effective Value-adding Tools for Traditional Food? Insights from the new-born Japanese GIs System. Proceedings in Food System Dynamics, 119-130.
Ishige, N. (2019). The History of Food Culture Exchange for Long-term Periods: Japan as an example. Senri Ethnological Studies, 100, 11-22.
Rath, E. C. (2016). Japan’s Cuisines: Food, Place, and Identity. Reaktion Books.
Stalker, N. K. (Ed.). (2018). Devouring Japan: Global Perspectives on Japanese Culinary Identity. Oxford University Press.