Why Barbecue Is an Essential Part of Black History為何燒烤在黑人歷史中不可或缺

Every summer of my child and teenagehood was peppered with cookouts1. After the passing of my grandfather—the true patriarchal glue of that side of my family—the large， food-centric gatherings ceased. Last month was the third anniversary of his death and it got me thinking about these cookouts that took me years to really appreciate and cherish. How memories of eating pulled pork， ribs， chicken， hot dogs， and hamburgers would end up bringing me comfort when I least expected it. It really cemented the idea of barbecues being universal to the Black American experience.

戶外燒烤填滿了我童年和青少年的每個夏天。但當(dāng)家族的真正父權(quán)紐帶——我的祖父過世后，這些以食物為中心的大型聚會就銷聲匿跡了。上個月是他老人家的3周年忌日，一下子將我的思緒拉回到數(shù)年后才欣賞和珍視的燒烤聚會中。那些吃手撕豬肉、肋排、雞肉、熱狗和漢堡包的記憶，會在不經(jīng)意間給我?guī)砦拷濉Ｎ业慕?jīng)歷切實強化了燒烤在美國黑人經(jīng)歷中普遍存在的觀念。

Barbecue aka BBQ is an integral cuisine to Black history and， by default， American history. But its roots are traced to Indigenous Caribbeans. In Adrian Miller’s new book Black Smoke： African Americans and the United States of Barbecue， he writes that the earliest account of what we think of barbecue as today goes back to 1513 when Taíno， the Indigenous People of the Caribbean discovered Christopher Columbus and his crew stealing and eating all of their meats being cooked over green， wood fires—including rabbit， fish， and “serpents2，” which were believed to be iguanas.

燒烤，也被稱為BBQ，是黑人歷史不可或缺的佳肴，當(dāng)然，也是美國歷史中不可或缺的一部分，而其本源可以追溯到加勒比地區(qū)的原住民。阿德里安·米勒的新書《黑煙：非洲裔美國人和美國燒烤》中提到，我們今天所認(rèn)為的燒烤的最早記錄可以追溯到1513年，當(dāng)時加勒比地區(qū)的土著民泰諾人發(fā)現(xiàn)克里斯托弗·哥倫布和他的船員偷吃了他們所有的肉。肉是用新鮮木柴生火烤制的，包括兔子、魚和“大蛇”——當(dāng)時的人們認(rèn)為那是鬣蜥。

The exact origins of the word “barbeque” are a little unclear and messy， much like a good sauce. But the word “barbacoa，” which is where our current term is adapted from， is attributed to what the Spanish called the Indigenous Peoples’ way of cooking meats over a wooden platform.

barbeque一詞的確切起源有些模糊和混亂，就像一種美味的醬料。但barbacoa一詞，也就是barbeque的來源，據(jù)說來自西班牙人對當(dāng)?shù)卦∶裨谀九_上烹肉方法的稱呼。

“When you hear about the early history of barbecue， the Native Americans are kind of a side note， right？” Miller tells us. “It’s just like， ‘Oh， some Europeans noticed how Native Americans were cooking and they took it over， added their European animals， took that from the Caribbean to the American South and barbecue was formed.’ And that just never really made sense to me because that ignores what Indigenous People and the American South were already doing before Europeans showed up.”

“當(dāng)你聽說燒烤的早期歷史時，美洲原住民就像個注腳一樣微乎其微，對吧？”米勒同我們講，“就好像，‘哦，一些歐洲人注意到美洲原住民是如何烹飪的，他們就把它拿來，加上歐洲的動物食材，再從加勒比地區(qū)帶到美國南方，于是燒烤就這樣誕生了。’這對我而言根本沒有道理，因為這忽略了原住民和美國南方人在歐洲人到來之前就已經(jīng)在做的事。”

Similarly to how those Native American traditions have long been an afterthought， I noticed that contributions of African Americans made to the cuisine often still go unnoticed today， despite barbecue’s constant presence in my family at the hands of Black men and women.

就如這些美洲原住民的傳統(tǒng)長期以來一直被忽視一樣，我注意到，盡管在我的家庭中始終由黑人男女操持燒烤，但非洲裔美國人對這種菜肴的貢獻(xiàn)直到今天仍時常不被重視。

“If we’re not in the media outlets in certain positions， we don’t get the opportunity to tell the stories in a real way. And I think that’s a long-time issue，” Conyers says. “The South has something to say. But if the media is not down there to see it， it’s missed. The major media outlets in America are in New York or the West Coast. The South is very rich， but we’re not present.”

科尼爾斯說：“如果我們不在媒體上擔(dān)任特定職位，我們就沒有機(jī)會真實地講述這些故事。我認(rèn)為這是一個長期存在的問題。南方人也有話要說，但如果主流媒體不深入南方實地去體會，就會錯失真相。美國的主流媒體都在紐約或西海岸。南方有著豐富的文化和歷史，但沒人聽見我們的聲音。”

A majority of the information Conyers learned about the history and culture surrounding barbecue was told to him verbally， starting with a stunning realization that stemmed from a sketch of a pit from his father.

科尼爾斯了解到的關(guān)于燒烤歷史文化的大部分信息，都是從口口相傳中得來的。他最早的認(rèn)識源于父親畫的烤坑草圖，那幅圖讓他有了個驚人的發(fā)現(xiàn)。

“I was giving a lecture at Dillard University and I asked my father if he could draw a sketch of the pit he learned how to cook with because we didn’t take any pictures of when we were cooking barbecue as a kid，” he says. “He drew a pit of a hole in the ground where he cooked and when I looked at that pit and compared it to what those pictures in the 1930s， 1940s and the late 1800s looked like， it told me that my connection to barbecue was directly tied into slavery. My father didn’t do any research. He just did what was shared with him， and then as a cook， you learn to do things over time.”

“那時我在迪拉德大學(xué)做講座，我問父親能否把他學(xué)習(xí)燒烤用的烤坑畫個草圖，因為我們小時候做燒烤時沒有拍過照片。”他說，“父親就畫了一個在地上挖的用于燒烤的坑，當(dāng)我把這個坑和20世紀(jì)三四十年代以及19世紀(jì)晚期的照片作對比時，我發(fā)現(xiàn)我與燒烤的聯(lián)系與奴隸制直接相關(guān)。我父親沒有做過任何研究。他只是做了別人教給他的事情，作為一名廚師，隨著時間推移，這些事情都能學(xué)會。”

He then describes his next course of action after this discovery as a “wild goose chase3，” where he sought out all the information he could about Black people and barbecue. This brought him to reading through the WPA4 Slave Narratives in the Library of Congress for any evidence of barbecuing in the South. These documents contain more than 2，000 first-person accounts of former enslaved Africans transcribed from audio recordings.

有了這一發(fā)現(xiàn)，科尼爾斯描述他接下來尋找關(guān)于黑人和燒烤所有信息的行為無異于“大海撈針”。這使他開始在國會圖書館查閱美國公共事業(yè)振興署的黑奴口述資料，以尋找燒烤發(fā)源于南方的證據(jù)。這些文件是由2000多份音頻記錄中轉(zhuǎn)錄而來，取自那些曾為奴隸的非裔美國人的第一人稱陳述。

Despite the intertwined relationship of Black people and barbecue—from slavery to present day—their contributions are still being ignored. Conyers points out that， in 2015， Fox News published a story about America’s most influential pitmasters and there was not one Black person on the list. He’s also quick to point out that women pitmasters of color rarely get their due.

盡管從奴隸制時期至今，黑人和燒烤都有著千絲萬縷的關(guān)系，但他們的貢獻(xiàn)仍然被忽視。科尼爾斯指出，2015年福克斯新聞網(wǎng)發(fā)表了一篇關(guān)于美國最有影響力的燒烤大師的報道，但沒有一位黑人在列。他還敏銳地提到，有色人種的女性燒烤師很少得到她們應(yīng)有的待遇。

“I’m excited to see what Black women do in barbecue，” Conyers says. “What people fail to realize is Black women were always in barbecue—just not in large numbers. Sometimes they did specialized tasks， like making the barbecue sauces， but sometimes they also did the cooking. There was this person in my community who cooked whole hogs just as good as the men. But she may be one of five in the community.”

“我很高興看到黑人女性在燒烤領(lǐng)域中的表現(xiàn)。”科尼爾斯說，“人們沒有意識到的是，盡管人數(shù)不多，黑人女性一直活躍在燒烤行業(yè)中。有時她們做些專門的工作，比如制作燒烤醬汁之類的，但有時她們也負(fù)責(zé)燒烤。我們社區(qū)有這樣一位女士，她烤整頭豬的技巧和男人一樣出色。不過社區(qū)里水平像她這樣的可能就五個人。”

As recently as October 2020， Desiree Robinson became the first Black woman to be inducted into the Barbecue Hall of Fame. Robinson co-founded Memphis’ BBQ staple Cozy Corner and will hopefully pave the way for more Black women to be recognized for their achievements and accomplishments in the barbecue world.

就在2020年10月，德西蕾·魯賓遜成為第一位入選燒烤名人堂的黑人女性。魯賓遜是孟菲斯燒烤名店“舒適角落”的聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人之一，且有望能為更多黑人女性在燒烤領(lǐng)域的成就和貢獻(xiàn)得到認(rèn)可鳴鑼開道。

Though the American barbecue scene has made recent strides in terms of diversifying and recognizing its pitmasters， there is still plenty of work to do and recognizing the cuisine’s complicated history might just be the first step.

盡管近期美國燒烤界在多元化和燒烤大師認(rèn)證方面取得了一些進(jìn)展，但仍有很多工作要做，認(rèn)識到這種烹飪方式的復(fù)雜歷史可能僅僅是第一步。

“I always tell people that my book is part celebration and part restoration，” Miller says about Black Smoke. “One key part is to celebrate different aspects of African-American barbecue culture， which I don’t think are known to the broader public： how African Americans like their ribs and why sauce still matters， things like that. Then the other thing is restoration and it’s to bring African Americans back to the center of the barbecue narrative.”

“我總是告訴人們，我的書中既有頌揚也有還原。”米勒談到《黑煙》時說，“一個重要部分是贊揚非裔美國人燒烤文化的多個方面，我認(rèn)為這些方面并不為廣大公眾所知：比如非裔美國人對排骨的熱愛，以及為何醬料仍很重要等等。另一部分是還原，即將非裔美國人重新置于燒烤敘事的中心。”

（譯者為“《英語世界》杯”翻譯大賽獲獎?wù)撸粏挝唬糊R齊哈爾大學(xué)）

1 cookout〈美口〉露天燒烤餐；野外燒烤宴會。

2 serpents蛇；（尤指）大蛇。

3 wild goose chase〈諺語〉比喻徒勞之舉、白費力氣的舉動。" 4 = Works Progress Administration，美國公共事業(yè)振興署。