Paper short abstract:

The "neighborhood mothers" have migrational experience and work as multipliers for health and bilingual education in Berlin. Representations of healthy eating evolve throughout this activity in the project. Ways of supporting their use of kitchen remedies as self-help strategy will be proposed.

Paper long abstract:

The ethnographic analysis of my MA was on the cognitive, phenomenological and praxeological processes of change in the representation of "healthy eating" through activity in the project Stadtteilmütter in Neukölln (En: "neighborhood mothers in Neukölln"). District mothers with migrational experience are trained for five months on ten topics concerning pre-school development, bilingual education and health care. They enrich the content with their own experience. Then they act as multipliers for same language speaking families in a series of home and school visits. The families consider the highest increase in learning on the topic of healthy nutrition.

The food culture of the home country and Ramadan are mostly considered as healthy. Helplessness has often been expressed regarding the consumption of sugary products among actual children. There is a general awareness on the culturally varying representation of overweight. It was often linked to depression and immobility. During the training the issues of industrial and local production of food were especially addressed. During the common meals some talked about inclusion of exotic/German food on their menu. The personal interviews revealed women considering themselves as responsible for the well-being of the family and hence influential regarding food habits. Nonetheless they have to negotiate with or inspire their relatives. Trustful, formal or informal circuits of congruent information were necessary for validation/invalidation of practices and tastes.

Food as a remedy was a fruitful topic and hence followed with some written and filmed products that are medically proved and socioculturally contextualized for supporting self-help strategies.