Re(membering) and Re(claiming) in My Mama's Kitchen: A Decolonial Feminist Video Ethnography

• In Event: Exploring Asian American Perspectives of Knowing and Being

Abstract

In this study, I draw upon Endarkened Feminist Epistemology (Dillard, 2012) and Decolonial Feminist Research (Rhee, 2020) to explore the epistemology of my mother, a first-generation Chinese immigrant. Based on data generated from the video-cued Qi ethnography method, I paid attention to my mother’s ways of knowing through her connectivity with Qi. The intentionality behind everything she does in the kitchen shows her ongoing relationship with the humannonhuman assemblage, as well as the way she transcends the existing boundaries of geographies, time, and cultures in order to be response-able in her ways of being. I conclude the paper by exploring the implications for the Asian American research community and beyond, as we conduct the work of collective rememory.

Author

• Eleanor Xiaoxiao Mehta, University of Georgia