Washington Post food critic says calling food ‘exotic’ is xenophobic and reinforces racism

“The first problem with the word is that, probably within the past two decades, it has lost its essential meaning,” she wrote. “The second, more crucial problem is that its use, particularly as applied to food, indirectly lengthens the metaphysical distance between one group of humans and another, and, in so doing, reinforces xenophobia and racism.”

The English language should adapt more quickly to ostracize words, such as “exotic,” “ethnic,” and “foreign,” to create a more inclusive society, she argued.

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“The problem is that it’s a definition that changes based on the user’s perspective,” Galarza said.

The piece cited Chandra D. L. Waring, a professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, who similarly argued that the word “exotic” is often used by white people and simply meant nonwhite.

“I have never heard the word exotic used in reference to something that is white,” Waring said, according to the article. “You know that exotic means ‘other’ or ‘different’ from a dominant-white perspective because no one ever says, ‘I’m going to go on an exotic vacation. I’m going to Lowell, Mass.’ No one ever says, ‘Let’s go to that exotic new restaurant. Let’s go to McDonald’s.’”

Serena J. Rivera, an assistant professor of Portuguese and Spanish at the University of Pittsburgh, agreed, saying that the word was “completely tied to the history of colonialism and slavery.”

“If you are exotic, if you’re automatically an ‘other,’ you’re not one of us. But for someone to make such a judgment, they would need to be in a position of power,” Rivera continued.

Galarza argued that the use of the word usually means non-European, “conjures” images of explorers or hunters, and places the “onus” on nonwhite countries to defend their cuisines.

“It’s been a long time since European explorers traveled the world in pursuit of wealth, spices, coffee, tea, chocolate and places they would colonize or people they would enslave — in short, things they would label exotic — but that history is inextricable from the word,” she added.

Many on social media disagreed with the take and claimed that “exotic” does not mean foreign, something Galarza admitted is an “archaic definition” of the word.

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