Book review: Molly Wizenberg, A Homemade Life

[lizw]

This was the Kitchen Reader selection for February, chosen by Jules of Stone Soup. It's a mostly-enjoyable memoir of her history with food and the way it has shaped the narrative of her life. I haven't cooked any of the recipes that are included in the book, yet, but they look clear and straightforward; I will probably try the chana masala and some of the salads. In the narrative itself, some of her description of her marriage resonated with me, especially this: "That's how I know we're going to be all right. Because being the person I want to be feels easier when he is around." I've definitely felt that about the strongest of my relationships, and especially about boxcat. I also liked the fact that she mentions poly and gay friends in a very matter-of-fact way; most food books steer away from anything unconventional. That left me all the more surprised, though, when she said about the stress of preparing for her own marriage, "Getting married is not for pansies" - an unfortunate choice of phrase to say the least, and not really consistent with her attitude elsewhere in the book. Perhaps it has different connotations in the US?

Comments

[mamadar]

I'm not sure "pansies" does have that anti-queer connotation here in the U.S., at least not any more. It might be a regionalism.

[lizw]

That's useful, thank you.

[marginaliana]

Although "pansies" definitely came from that same anti-queer space, I would say that 99% of the people in the US who would use such a term would not be intending to specifically imply a queerness element. They'd be more likely to just mean "coward." On the other hand, there's definitely a 'flowers are feminine, feminine is bad' thing going on, which is related. Actually, hmm, I'm wondering now if there are any euphemisms for "coward" that aren't gender-related in some way.

[tree_and_leaf]

"Chicken"?

[lizw]

"Chicken" has a slang meaning of a young gay man, particularly one who has an older male partner, although I don't know whether that usage is responsible for the "coward" meaning.

[tree_and_leaf]

Gosh. I had no idea.

[lizw]

It's a "fresh meat" thing, so pretty icky if sexual objectification bothers you (it bothers me if it's non-consensual, but I can't speak for how the young men it gets applied to generally feel about it.) A friend over on LJ thinks it's not related to the "coward" meaning, though.

[lizw]

I'd usually say "not for the fainthearted", which I think is not gendered - or is "faint heart never won fair lady" a strong enough association to make it masculine-gendered? It's also from a different register, of course, so not necessarily interchangeable in all situations. But I think it would do for a food memoir.

[arlie]

Agreed that "pansy" seems to me to mean something like wimp - not precisely a coward, because they might also shy away from hard work, as well as conflict.

Also a general comment - the more one sees queerness as part of normality, the less resonance one experiences with queer-directed slurs, and the more they are likely to be forgotten, or take on other meanings (often the specific thing that was being misattributed to queers); the same for any other historically denigrated/abused group. This isn't true if one has a political identification with the group, just if one has a matter of fact acceptance.

As an example, growing up in Canada, where issues of race weren't salient, I never noticed that one version of the children's rhyme "eeny meeny miney moe" apparently objectifies blacks, and uses one of the "N" words. "Nigger" got converted to "tiger", because that word at least made sense. On the other hand, if there had been a "frog" involved, I'd probably have taken it as somehow denigrating francophones, even if there was no historical connection - and some of my peers would have used it to mock local francophone kids.

[lizw]

That rhyme uses "tiger" in the UK too, but my understanding is that it was changed specifically because race was salient and people had become aware of the offence it caused. Also, cases where words drop out of use because they no longer make sense seem to me to be significantly different from cases where the word is still in use, but the majority have forgotten its offensive origin and the previously-targeted minority have not. In the first case, no-one is likely to feel marginalised; in the second, people probably will. The ability to be ignorant of an offensive etymology is a privilege that not everyone can share.

[arlie]

The ability to be ignorant of an offensive etymology is a privilege that not everyone can share.

True enough. It's just that, from your description of the author, I think they might have that privilege, to the point of being quite unconscious of the offensive connotations.

[lizw]

That does seem likely.