What is the importance of food in the short story "Girl"?

In the very
short story "" by , food is mentioned several times. The story is written as
adelivered by an overbearing Caribbean mother to her daughter. The mother instructs her daughter
on the proper way of doing things as a woman so as not to be perceived as a "slut."
The many domestic tasks her mother outlines include how to cook pumpkin fritters, how to
"eat your food in such a way that it won't turn someone else's stomach," and how to
set tables for various types of meals. The cooking and table setting instructions add to the
story's themes of domesticity and subservience as they both imply that the girl will one day
live a life where she is hosting and housekeeping for others. In these moments, the mother
embodies the oppressive patriarchal culture, and (some scholars argue) the strict rules of
colonialism.

The instructions given on how to eat food, rather than how to
prepare it, serve a slightly different purpose. Because eating is a bodily function, these
instructions get much more personal, even sensual. "Don't eat fruit on the streetflies will
follow you" can easily be read as coded instructions about the girl's sexuality. Don't
flaunt your enjoyment of sensuous delights (eating fruit) lest you attract unwanted
attention.

The story ends on a food image. The narrator tells her daughter to
always squeeze the bread at the market and the daughter interjectsone of only two times she is
able to break through her mother's lectureto ask "but what if the baker won't let me feel
the bread?" And the mother is outraged that her daughter might grow up to be the kind of
woman not allowed to feel the bread. Here food is a symbol of respectability. The right kind of
woman would be trusted to feel bread before purchasing it, because there would be no doubt as to
her respectability and character.

Thus food operates in three ways throughout
the story: as a totem of domesticity, a symbol of sexuality, and a marker of societal
acceptability.