Crying in H Mart

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What is comfort food? Can you give examples? What dishes are likely among people’s top five comfort meals in the region where you live? Why do you think that people find those foods to be comforting?

Teaching Suggestion: Thinking about comfort food can help students start to consider the theme of Food’s Relationship to Cultural and Family Identity and the importance that Zauner gives to Korean food and its connections to her mother. Consider accessing or sharing these or similar resources with students to help inform and discuss this topic.

• “Why Comfort Food Comforts” is an Atlantic article that discusses a 2015 study about the social function of comfort food. (Subscription may be needed for viewing.)
• April White’s article “A Brief History of Comfort Food” from JSTOR explains the history of the term “comfort food” (first attributed to Liza Minnelli in 1970) and explores past and present comfort foods.

2. Why would an author choose to write a memoir rather than an autobiography? What is the difference between these two genres? How does a reader’s approach to the text differ between a memoir and an autobiography? What are some examples of a memoir?