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Paper short abstract:

In colonial Mexico, the Spaniards upheld racially charged hierarchies between staple foods maize and wheat. This shift still holds sway today, with rising influence of the Western diet. The increasing replacement of maize holds major implications for native groups’ spiritual, communal and land ties.

Paper long abstract:

Maize and still is of major cultural and spiritual importance to many Mesoamerican indigenous peoples, playing a major role in creation myths. In pre-colonial times, it formed the basis of a diverse diet, together with other staple foods such as beans and squash. Early colonial manuscripts depict maize as a marker of development for many native groups. Early on, for the Spaniards, the consumption of European foods like wheat in the Americas was central to their diet and Catholic rituals, whereas eating American plants was considered dangerous and tied to fears of “turning Indian”. This was part of a larger hierarchy between foodstuffs tied up with ideas of health, religion and race. In addition, indigenous ways of working the land were oftentimes replaced by European forms of agriculture, considered superior. Still, maize was then and still is an essential staple of the Mexican diet.

Firstly, this paper discusses the place of maize and its attempted replacement with wheat in central colonial Mexico, with a focus on the Nahua people. Second, drawing on an ethnographic case study with Yucatec Maya people in Mexico, the paper discusses the neoliberal food regime and changing patterns of consumption following NAFTA in the modern era. Currently, traditional hand-made maize tortillas are increasingly replaced by commodified wheat and corn products in people’s daily diet. Based on historical and ethnographic approaches, the paper aims to trace the transformations of food ways by asking what they might mean for spiritual, communal and land ties in Mexican society.