Milk Culture in Insular Southeast Asia Recognized as a Non-milk Cultural Sphere

Abstract

The issues of milk processing techniques and milk use in areas considered outside the milk cultural sphere is an extremely significant case study for analyzing the transmission and transition of culture. The purpose of this paper is to (1) identify the areas where milk culture is practiced in Insular Southeast Asia, (2) analyze the characteristics of milk processing techniques and milk uses, and (3) examine the origins and transitions of milk culture based on the results of the authors’ fieldwork and literature surveys. Nakao’s model was used to categorize the milk processing techniques and to analyze those characteristics. The characteristics of milk products in the Philippines and Indonesia are that milk products are produced mainly as a source of cash income from sales and consumed as nutritional supplements and luxury foods, not as essential subsistence foods. When milk culture was transferred to both countries from the milk cultural sphere where milk products are essential for a dairy diet, the abundant availability of plant and marine foods may have caused the lack of most milk processing techniques and the transition of milk products from essential subsistence foods to supplementary luxury foods. The Philippines adopts additive coagulation processes, while Indonesia adopts fermentation, heat condensation, and additive coagulation processes. This localized mosaic of milk processing techniques is a characteristic of milk culture in Insular Southeast Asia. This paper discovered that milk culture has spread to Insular Southeast Asia, but identical milk processing techniques were not widely shared in areas where milk culture was not an essential cultural element in local livelihoods. It is concluded that milk culture in the Philippines started with the influence of Spain and was subsequently modified under the influence of India and China, while milk culture in Indonesia originated under the influence of India.