Preserving Corn Based-Local Food Culture: Case Study in Pagerejo Village, District of Wonosobo, Central Java

Abstract

The article describes efforts to preserve local food culture. Local people previously consumed various local food, but now they tend to consume rice and wheat as staple food.  Food diversification policies and programs failed to encourage the people to reduce consumption of rice and wheat. As a consequence, availability of local food has reduced, and people tends to switch from consuming local food to rice and wheat-based food. In the context of domination of national (rice) and global (wheat) food culture, using Williams’s theory of culture, and based on case study method, the article delineates production, distribution and consumption of corn-based food in Pagerejo village, district of Wonosobo, province of Central Java. The local people of Pagerejo have preserved corn-based food culture as a residual culture. The corn-based food culture is a part of past food culture that has still lived and been practiced by the local people.