Salivary Dangers and their Resolution: Eating Gong Can Style in China during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Issue 3 (1st December 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Zong, Chenyu
• Is Part Of: Anthropology in action. Volume 29:Issue 3(2022)
• Page Start: 23
• Page End: 30
• Publication Date: 2022-12-01
• Subjects: China -- COVID-19 pandemic -- fen can eating style -- gong can eating style -- hygiene -- intimacy -- saliva; Applied anthropology -- Periodicals; Anthropology -- Periodicals; 306
• DOI: 10.3167/aia.2022.290303
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1752-2285

Abstract

Abstract: In China, when people have a meal together, it is certainly possible for individuals to order a personal dish that is not for sharing with others. But it is far more common for food to be exchanged directly between hands, between hands-and-mouths and, as I will describe shortly, effectively between mouths. This describes the circumstance when consumers directly eat food from a shared dish, with the effect that they encounter each other's saliva. This mode of consumption is called gong can . On the face of it, it seems foolhardy to continue to eat together in such a way during a pandemic that travels between bodies through connecting droplets, like saliva, especially when other forms of eating together are available. Why is such a mode preferred during the COVID-19 pandemic? What makes it safe?