Memories, relationships and identity: food-related narratives and memory among Japanese descendants in Broome, Western Australia

ABSTRACT

This article addresses how food cooked by Japanese first-generation migrants, both its making and meaning, is remembered and re-interpreted by their descendants in the remote coastal town of Broome, northern Western Australia. From the 1880s to the 1960s Japanese migrants flowed into Broome for its pearl-shelling industry and related businesses. Some, mostly men, intermarried with local Indigenous people, resulting in mixed heritage descendants who now live dispersed among their non-Japanese family members, seemingly assimilated into the multicultural society that constitutes Broome. In conversations with these Japanese descendants, memories related to food cooked at home by their Japanese first-generation ancestors often surfaced despite these foods being rarely eaten. Though these memories are not of the food itself, but of the family meals and social relations accompanying them, mentioning “food” helps them express their diverse relationships with their Japanese ancestors, support their nuanced identification with Japanese heritage, as well as respond to various images of “Japanese-ness” they encounter in the globalized world. A key finding of the research is that these Japanese descendants utilized food-related memories to articulate and position themselves in different contexts, despite not exhibiting strong Japanese cultural traits, including eating or cooking the aforementioned “food.”

KEYWORDS:

• Japanese migrants
• Australia
• mixed heritage
• ancestral relationships
• food
• memories
• identity

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Mr Itsushi Shioji, Maya Shioji, Hiroko Shioji and their family members, Mr. Akira Masuda, Cauline Masuda, Sandra Masuda, Christina Masuda, Lucy Dann, Tomoko Matsumoto, Philip Matsumoto, Darren Matsumoto, Neil Hamaguchi, Dwayne Hamaguchi, Yoshi Hunter. I also thank those who wished to remain unnamed. I am also indebted to Broome Asian-Aboriginal community members for their generosity and kindness during my fieldwork. Thanks also to Prof. Sandy Toussaint, Dr. Cecilia Leong-Salobir, and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. Finally, thanks to Mr. Derek Wee for editing my English. All the mistakes and misinterpretations in this article are mine.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. I use pseudonyms unless the interviewee expressly asked to be named. Names in quotation marks are pseudonyms.

2. The term “Indigenous Australians” refers to the Indigenous people of Australia, including “Aboriginal Australians” of the mainland and smaller islands, and Torres Strait Islanders. In this article “Indigenous Australian” denotes Aboriginal Australians.

3. I use “descendants and ancestors” for brevity. Due to the long and complex history of Japanese migration, interlocutors may inhabit anywhere between the second to ninth generation, and it is too complicated to mention their generation.

4. “Western food” refers to the food influenced by British and Irish migrants during British colonization, and often consists of agricultural products such as beef cattle, sheep, and wheat as major staple.

5. Pearl shelling attracted many people from Asia to Broome. As for this Broome fusion food, see Ganter (2006) and Yu (1999). The importance of the Broome fusion food is also emphasized by Broome Asian (including Japanese)- Indigenous Australian mixed descendants.

6. Though tried, I could not visit Broome from 2020–2022 due to COVID-19.

7. Broome is well known for Indigenous Australian-Asian mixed heritage musicians. Although their music is often associated with the pearl shelling history of the town, they are associated with the entire Indigenous Australian-Asian mixed community more so than with one particular ethnic group. For example, see Pigram brothers official website (Pigram brothers n.d.).

8. For example, in 1901 there were 303 Japanese men and 63 Japanese women in Broome (Sissons 1977). Pearl-shelling attracted not only Japanese but many workers from areas such as South East Asia and China (Martinez and Vickers 2015). Since many were indentured laborers, there was a severe shortage of Asian women. Although these ethnic groups commingled, the local ethnic hierarchy, with White people on the top, Japanese and other Asians next, and Aboriginal Australians at the bottom, prevented Asian men from having relationships with White women (Ganter 2006; see also Choo 1995, 2009).

9. The Western Australian authority tried to prevent relationships between Asian men and Aboriginal women and enacted discriminatory legislation that would be unacceptable today. However, the Asian-Indigenous Australian mixed descent population increased. As for details, see Dalton (1964).

10. Many Japanese migrants to Broome were from Taiji. This led to the sister city relationship forming in the 1980s.

11. A local shop, Wing’s, run by an old Chinese family, has a good collection of Japanese ingredients.

12. I also add that this also provide a case of male domestic cooking, which has not been shed much light on.

13. Some remember “Obon,” a traditional Japanese annual festival for the dead, being held when they grew up.

14. They also acknowledge and identify as having Indigenous Australian heritage. As the host society’s side, Indigenous Australians identity does not need to be stated in the same way as Japanese identity. (cf. Glowczewski 2011). Some Broome Japanese descendants have other Asian heritage and acknowledge them as well. However, for those with Japanese surnames, the Japanese (and Indigenous Australian) side often comes forward.

15. Lucy requested me to use her real name when I interviewed her. She wrote a memoir about visiting Japan and meeting her father in 2003 (Dann 2003). I interviewed her in 2015. I indicate where I use what she wrote in her memoir.

16. “Tamagokake gohan” is a common Japanese dish. It consists of cooked rice with raw egg and soy sauce on top.

17. The number of Japan-born people in Australia was 966 in 1954, 2307 in 1961, 3124 in 1966, 4929 in 1971, 6255 in 1976, 8060 in 1981 (Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics 1963, 1968, 1973; Australian Bureau of Statistics 1979, 1983; Janowski 2012). Mizukami (2007) writes that from the late 1950s to the mid-1980s, most Japanese visitors to Australia came for business, and were mainly so-called “corporate sojourners,” who usually stayed three to five years before returning to Japan. They were financially middle class and clustered in metropolitan cities such as Sydney and Melbourne.

18. I helped her family find their Japanese relatives and accompanied them on their visit to Japan.

19. See the note 16 about “Tamagokake gohan.”

20. Although sushi often uses raw fish, the making of sushi involves a lot of cooking, for example, boiling rice, cooking some ingredients such as omelets and stewed vegetables.

21. Exceptions could be found in other pearl-shelling industry centers such as Thursday Island and Darwin.

22. See note 17 for the Japanese migration after 1954.

23. This restaurant closed in 2017, clearly for reasons other than COVID-19. Other Asian restaurants in Broome may have closed in 2020–2022 because of the pandemic.

24. Affordable for many Japanese descendants, but still priced higher than ordinary restaurants.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science under Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research C, number 17K0325.