Chinese migrant food business in Italy and design researches for intercultural dialogue

Abstract

In the age of globalization, different ethnic cultures spread in the migratory flows, and coexist with local cultures, sometimes producing cultural conflicts which are looming with the increasing numbers of migrants that call for the intercultural dialogue. Food for its communicational and cultural attributes can be regard as a point-cut that intercultural dialogue can be fostered basing on the cultural seminaries and differences. The overseas Chinese community in Milan has reached a considerable population, and the migrants have adapted to the local economy while maintaining forms of social separation that is regarded as a cultural enclave. This paper takes the Chinese migrant food business as the breakthrough since it is one of the most common migratory activities in Milan, and Italian people relatively wider accept Chinese food. This paper adopts two digital methods, OpenStreetMaps (OSM) and Web crawler, to capture the context of Chinese migrant food business in Milan and to explore Italian customers’ viewpoints about it. The result shows the need of improving Chinese migrants’ public image and enriching Italian hosts’ knowledge of migrants. The paper proposes four design goals: information sharing; participatory knowledge production; co-create value; and scale out from individuals to communities. The investigation can benefit to intercultural dialogue, and it provides a reference to improving the cross-cultural communication towards to sustainable pluralistic society.