(Masala) Chai

On Reclaiming the Voice (and Spice) of the Indian Collective

I remember being eight years old, and eating my lunch under the table because I was embarrassed about the healthy Indian meal my mother had cooked for me. Despite not being tangibly othered, I had internalized a narrative about the food of my culture that was never my own. Now, at nineteen years old and in college, the first thing I crave when I go home is a hot bowl of my mother’s spinach dahl, and masala chai. Masala Chai, which means spiced tea in Hindi, is a healing concoction that has been transmitted through my family for generations. It is so much more than the infamous Starbucks Chai Tea Latte. I spend weeks looking forward to sitting around the wooden dining table with family after lunch, talking and sipping from our mugs of chai. Meanwhile, thousands walk into Starbucks not realizing that the over sweetened latte they are drinking is no more authentic than cafeteria lunch meat.

As a child, I was surrounded by people who misrepresented and monetized my culture, and I internalized a false narrative about my identity—that it was not something for me to claim. What I didn’t realize at the time was that it has never been about my culture, but who adopts its practices, rewriting a narrative that was not theirs to begin with. Starbucks’s appropriation and commodification of chai, decontextualizes the beverage’s historic meaning, perpetuating a colonial marketing narrative that does not foster cross-cultural exchange, but endorses continued Western domination, and undermines marginalized voices within India.

The East India Tea Company was notorious for its harsh labor practices and exploitation of indigenous peoples. Established in 1600, it was a mercantilist monopoly linking both Eastern and Western worlds with the objective of expanding England’s own wealth (Brunton 78). During the Planter’s Raj—the era of ongoing domination by tea planters in British India–-the British mobilized hundreds of indentured tea laborers from Jharkhand and Eastern India under the 1863 Transport of Native Laborers Act (Bengt). These people were known as ‘coolies’ and have often been compared to the indentured African American slaves who worked on cotton plantations in America (Colás 394).  In 1874, the EIC was eventually dissolved by the British government due to the rise of free-market ideas and criticism of its trading monopoly. Imperial rule under the British Raj was instituted in its place (Brunton 81). 

In the second half of the 19th century, when the British began establishing tea plantations in Assam. They discovered that tea, Camellia sinensis, was native to the region, just as it had been in China, with whom they had geopolitical rivalry. The British expropriated the land of the region from indigenous peoples and forced the plant onto monoculture plantations. They dramatically altered the region through infrastructure such as roads, railways, and telegraph lines which were built to foster interconnectivity with the world market. On monoculture plantations the indigenous plant, although high yielding, was more vulnerable to disease than in the forest and had been “‘deprived of the power of flowering and fruiting’” (Bengt). Similarly, thousands of ‘coolie’ women were forced onto plantations where they encountered harsh, unlivable working conditions and were exploited under colonial rule. In advertisements to colonial consumers, the British marketed a falsely idyllic narrative that masked the oppression of these women and sugarcoated the ecological devastation they had wrought (Harris).

 In her essay, Two Leaves and a Bud: Tea and the Body through a Colonial Lens, Harris analyzes how photographs and advertisements of Ceylonese female plantation workers portray effortless labor, while simultaneously fetishizing the South Asian female body. This can be seen in the advertising motif used on Brooke Bond tea packages: a submissive tea picker picking two leaves and a bud with her hair “…covered by a veil, her wrists…adorned with bracelets, and…a serene expression on her face that gives no sign of hardship” (Harris). The British historically used indigenous stereotypes in colonial photography to alleviate fears of the unruly indigenous identity, that they strove to quell. Through the concept of the picturesque, Harris analyzes colonial advertisements, revealing that like the tea that they picked, women were represented as an “exotic, colonial commodity,” and rendered as objects of colonial fascination (Harris).  

The British’s attempt to romanticize these women, while simultaneously bringing them under their control, is a marketing strategy that is still very much alive today. Today’s wellness industry is full of exoticized products and being able to purchase them has become synonymous with wealth and privilege. Take for example Matcha, which has been removed from its Zen Buddhist origins and brought into a wellness industry where it is homogenized with excess milk and sugar to render it palatable to Western consumers (I’m looking at you Blank Street) (Chawla and Haisang 7). The colonial mindset of adapting, “taming,” and altering cultural practices persists, allowing implicit Western domination and appropriation.

In the U.S, the historical origins of Chai are largely unknown. The beverage is equated with India despite the fact that it was initially perceived as a foreign commodity produced by an aggressive colonial regime. In fact, Gandhi is said to have endearingly referred to chai as “the blood of the peasants of Assam” (Lutgendorf). While tea was marketed as an exotic commodity to Britishers, the British spread tea propaganda to Indians as well, especially during the Great Depression. They cited chai’s moral benefits claiming that “drinking tea would make Indians more alert, energetic, and even punctual – in short, more like Britishers;” they further stated chai would be a unifying nationalist beverage for all of India (Lutgendorf). They also marketed the beverage towards uneducated Indian women, on the premise that drinking tea would allow them to awaken intellectually (Lutgendorf). Never mind, the irony of marketing a beverage that required thousands of indentured laborers (many of whom were women), as a progressive force for awakening and unity. 

It was not until 1947–-after independence–- that tea was widely consumed in India and Indians began to reclaim the marketing narrative. With the advent of Indian plantation owners, tea was no longer marketed as a colonial commodity, nor advertised as a civilizing force; it was viewed as a symbol of profound liberation and national identity, as it remains for many Indians today. Much of this change was because chai was now seen as safe to consume, since it was 100% Indian produced, or Swadeshi. As a beverage, it fostered post-independence camaraderie, bridging pre-existing colonial divisions. Small tea stalls, and ‘tea cabins’ began cropping up in regions such as Calcutta and Bombay and within them, men of all castes would gather in intellectual discussion. Larger companies, like the Gujarati owned Wagh Bakri, rose as well, marketing on the premise of ‘Be Indian, buy Indian.’ These larger companies coexisted with smaller, down-to-earth tea shops, which in many regions, such as Rajasthan, possessed inter-business alliances, and relationships with the local community (Lutgendorf).

It was often said that in the tea shop, everyone was equal. Yet, while there was progress, this was not fully true. Despite the fact that minority groups played a significant role in the colonial narrative surrounding chai, women were often excluded from intellectual chai circles. There was also ongoing prejudice against Muslims, and the caste system persisted. The standard for equality and representation at the time largely revolved around Hindu men (Lutgendorf). The representation of Indian culture in the West, similarly, excludes minority groups, while subverting any agency Indians regained over the chai narrative. To analyze these ideas more thoroughly, we need only examine the modern marketing of yoga; a sacred art form turned multibillion dollar industry that has been commodified as Hindu woo-woo magic. 

Initially yoga served as an act of resistance against the British, who ostracized and even criminalized those associated with yoga (Hurd 213).  Because the British could not control yogi, they demonized the yogi. Both Hindus, Muslims were encouraged to practice yoga as a form of “emancipatory political action” that was “…not confined to any single religion” or caste and represented India in its entirety (213).  Today, in the Western world, yoga is often fetishized and romanticized. My grandmother does yoga in the living room every morning—and no, not in her all black alo athleisure, but in her sari. Modern studios paint reductive images of yoga using Indian music and Sanskrit words to present the picture of authenticity. 

The desire for authenticity results in neo-orientalist fetishization that often foregrounds high-caste, Hindu men naming them gurus, or founders, while disregarding women, Muslims, and lower caste communities (Hurd 219). Likewise, the appropriation of chai in a society that is dominated by high-caste Hindus, neglects the voices of marginalized demographics within India who were historically impacted by colonial rule. Thus, the “minority of Indians who are agents within the Western practice of yoga come to represent yoga’s ‘authentic’ Indian roots” (219). In reality, the Indian diaspora to the United States reflects only 15-20% of the population in terms of caste, class and religious background, and by equating the caste-privileged Hindu with Orientalist notions of India, we unknowingly perpetuate the oppression against Dalits and religious minorities in India (221).

The Starbucks Chai Tea Latte is as simplistic as Western conceptions of yoga. The beverage is homogenized as it “retains select superficial elements of Masala Chai, such as its spiced flavor but significantly alters its preparation, taste, and context” (Chawla and Haisang 2). Starbucks markets the drink as having mystical roots, even though the chai tea latte is laughably spiced to resemble a Christmas pudding (Lutgendorf). The drink is milky, over sweetened and promoted as a wellness commodity, removed from its cultural, social, and ritualistic significance with India. Traditional chai is boiled with spices such as cardamom, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and black tea.  By removing the ritualistic methods of tea preparation that often take longer, Starbucks abbreviates the beverage’s colonial history, separating chai from its liberatory symbolism and context while perpetuating ideas of ern domination (Chawla and Haisang 5). 

Food has always been a way for imperial powers to exert their control over colonized peoples, as we can see not only in the case of India, but in cases such as the Spanish Conquest of Americas (Colás). In light of this, we need to have greater sensitivity when rebranding foods with cultural and colonial history, so that we dismantle cycles of oppression. Research has shown that as globalization and commercialization increase, and countries are catering to an international market, the authenticity of cultural products declines, and beverages–such as chai— become exploited by Western corporations. When trying to meet the demands of a global market, and adapt food for Western palates, we prioritize convenience over authenticity, overlooking the healing force that chai played for a post-colonial country. After some time, authentic chai becomes determined by a product’s performance in the global market rather than the ritualistic process of boiling tea (Chawla and Haisang 8). To fully reclaim the narrative surrounding chai we must subvert a marketing system that discounts the colonial narrative in its entirety and allows oppression to persist through appropriation. We must strive to understand the beverage’s colonial history and ritual meaning by unpacking the complex intersectionality of caste, religion and class (Hurd 218).

Using a post-colonial framework, we can see that the advertising and marketing of chai, performed by the British, persists in America today. The British, historically exoticized vulnerable South Asian tea pickers to sell tea back in England, despite the unethical working conditions which they suffered. They further marketed chai as a civilizing force to Indians. Similarly, Starbucks rebrands chai as the exotic chai tea latte, which is homogenized for the Western palate, through the omission of traditional spices. The omission of these spices is paralleled by a general masking of the controversial (and somewhat spicy), history surrounding the beverage. Pierre Bourdieu’s framework of Cultural Capital demonstrates how Starbucks’s redefinition and commodification of cultural knowledge, exerts dominance over the Indian narrative, instead of seeking cross-cultural discourse with it (Chawla and Haisang 7). Purchasers are unknowingly and symbolically consuming “the other” via the romanticization of chai, just like how South Asian women on tea plantations were romanticized for British consumption. Starbucks, therefore, engages in colonial mimicry and Western domination, as it rewrites the traditional Indian identity (9).

Chai has never simply been a mid-afternoon drink, but a reminder of what my ancestors went through, and a way to honor their stories. The marketing of chai in the West severs it from its deeply spiritual, and historical origins within my community. By appropriating Indian culture in its marketing strategy, Starbucks perpetuates a cycle like that of the colonial regime, in which a country’s culture is exploited for capital gain and minorities within the nation are either excluded from the marketing narrative, or misrepresented.

Bibliography

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Hurd, Elizabeth Shakman, and Winnifred Fallers Sullivan. At Home and Abroad: The Politics of American Religion. Columbia University Press, 2021, pp. 210–22, https://research.ebsco.com/plink/8d3246fe-aaa4-3bc6-8b9d-e16670e44748.

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