The foodscape of the urban poor in Jakarta: street food affordances, sharing networks, and individual trajectories

ABSTRACT

In Jakarta’s poor kampungs, out-of-home purchase of ready-to-eat products from street vendors, the lack of home cooking and public eating produce a foodscape where the boundaries between the home and the public space seem blurred. The aim of this paper is to define those boundaries in accordance with the cultural, social and economic context by analyzing how street food practices shape and produce the space. Following an ethnographic and qualitative approach, and a representative quantitative survey we described and measured individual and collective food practices in relationship with the uses and perceptions of space. The study shows that eating practices in the kampung depend mainly on street foods as home-cooking practices decrease. But still, the dynamic spatial display of the food system and the communalization of the public areas generate sharing networks that go beyond the household toward the community formed by eaters, street vendors, neighbors and family. The preference for traditional cuisine and the familiar environment of the vicinity in which this food model is rooted enlarge the concept of “homemade” and redefine the roles and dimensions of “out-of-home” food practices.

KEYWORDS:

• street food
• eating socializations
• urbanization
• informality
• Jakarta

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Author’s translation

2. The research project was conducted by the author under the supervision of Pr. Jean-Pierre Poulain (Université de Toulouse Jean-Jaurès) and Nicolas Bricas (CIRAD – UMR MOISA – Montpellier France) and in collaboration with the Faculty of Public Health of Universitas Indonesia under the supervision of Pr. Evi Martha.

3. All the socio-economic data and administrative information of the population in the kampung was provided by the official office, the kelurahan of kampung Melayu, in East-Jakarta district.

4. Mobile food vending carts

5. Spontaneous stalls (not mobile) covered by a tent

6. Fixed stalls selling prepared traditional food.

7. Fried rice.

8. Compressed rice cakes.

9. Sweet cakes.

10. Fixed stalls selling oil, spices, rice and other imperishable products.

11. White rice, staple food.

12. « Je préfère acheter de la nourriture que la cuisiner, car nous pouvons obtenir un menu différent en achetant de la nourriture. Si nous cuisinons, nous n’avons qu’un seul menu. Alors on s’ennuie facilement. Si nous cuisinions, nous devons rester sur un seul menu du matin au soir. Mais si nous achetons, nous pouvons obtenir des menus différents. Pour que les enfants ne s’ennuient pas, ils peuvent choisir ce qu’ils veulent. En tant qu’adulte, nous aussi nous nous sentons parfois ennuyés par la nourriture. »

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Agropolis Fondation; Danone Research Center for Specialized Nutrition.

Notes on contributors

Laura Arciniegas

Laura Arciniegas is socio-anthropolgist. She holds a Master’s degree in Sociology of Food from the Toulouse School of Tourism, Hospitality Management and Food studies (ISTHIA). For her Ph.D program she was a research fellow at the Cirad (Agricultural Research for Development Center in Montpellier France) and at the CERTOP department of the French National Center for Scientific Research under the supervision of Professor Jean-Pierre Poulain. Understanding the relationship between food and society has been the pivot of her career since her early approaches of the cultural dimensions of Colombian cuisine until her research work on the social, cultural and nutritional dimensions of street food in the lives of urban poor dwellers in Jakarta. More precisely, her academic project explores the relationship between food, sociability and the material world, and its evolution, in the context of accelerated urbanization in the Global South. She has presented her work in many international conferences in Latin America, Asia and Europe.