筷子的重要性The Importance of Chopsticks

A: In the 17th century, when a British businessman heard that there were 100 million people in China, he was determined to go there and sell spoons. He thought, even if a spoon would only sell for one penny, he would still make 100 million pennies, but he didn’t succeed. The Chinese people used chopsticks, not spoons.

B: Some people did some research on the origin of China’s chopsticks compared to the knife and fork in the West. One theory is that China was an agricultural society and relied on vegetables for food. Chopsticks were very convenient tools for eating. The Westerners, on the other hand, were nomads and lived on meat. The knife and fork were more practical. Others believe that China did not have much industry, and therefore people used chopsticks. The West was an industrial society, so their eating utensils were made of metal.

A: Sounds interesting! When I first learned that the Chinese use a pair of sticks to eat with, I was curious how they would drink soup. Just like the Indians who use their fingers to eat, do they also use their fingers to drink soup?

B: Whatever the reasons why the Chinese use chopsticks and Westerners use knife and fork, it is a result of their respective cultures. Chinese culture is developed around collectivism which stresses communion and harmony. Western culture emphasizes individualism. In terms of eating customs, chopsticks and knives and forks are two desperate expressions of this cultural difference. The Chinese like to have communal meals where everybody eats out of the same bowl of food. Chopsticks were used in order to discourage people from eating more than others. This was not only a good way to preserve collectiveness, but also to limit individualism. It is more straightforward in the West. People eat their meals on their own, and there is no restriction on how to eat.

A: That sounds quite reasonable.

B: In addition, table manners are very strict during the Chinese meal. Respect has to be given to the elderly. Each time a dish is served, everyone has to wait until the elder person starts or, “to cut the ribbon,” as it is now called. The Westerners will simply say, “Help yourself,” to start. The food is brought to the table all of the same time so everybody is on the same starting line. This lacks the warm atmosphere which prevails at a Chinese dinner.

A: This may be the reason why it is always very noisy at the Chinese dinner but quiet in a Western restaurant.

Background Reading

Taboo of the Chopsticks

In ancient China, chopsticks signified far more than tools that take food to the mouth; they also signified status and rules, "can" and "can't." During the Northern Song Dynasty, an official named Tang Su once had dinner with the emperor. He was not well informed in noble table etiquette and so laid down his chopsticks horizontally on the table before the emperor did. As a result, he was expatriated to a frontier area for penal servitude.

In ancient eating etiquette, there were over a dozen taboos concerning chopsticks. For example,they could not be placed vertically into a dish, as this was the way of making sacrifices to the dead. Diners could not tap or push a dish with chopsticks, nor use a chopstick as a fork by poking it into a piece of food. When taking food, they could not go from one dish to another or let their chopsticks cross over those of others. When diners wanted to put their chopsticks during a meal, they would place them lengthways on a chopstick holder,or on the plate, or spoon on their right hand side. Many of these chopstick taboos are valid to this day and accepted as a norm in today's table etiquette.