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ItemCommunity gardens for migrants: reshaping cultural identity through adaptations in gardening practices( 2010)This research aims to investigate the extent to which people's cultural background influences migrants' gardening practices in the community gardens settings in Melbourne, as an attempt to understand their adaptation to their new place in host countries. A survey was undertaken by interviewing eleven migrant gardeners and two support workers across five multicultural community gardens under Cultivating Community. The findings confirm a relationship between historical garden practices/culture and the reality of practices in the community gardens, as discussed in previous literature. However, the degree to which the gardeners desire to preserve their past garden practices vary. It depends on the range of historical connections to distant gardens and garden practices felt by the gardeners. Combined with the social connections expected to be cultivated in the gardens, the practices generally change, following an acculturation process. In turn, the level of similarity of practices across the allotments may reflect the degree of multicultural interactions that occur there but may equally reflect information learned from other sources (like books and TV). The assumption of social well-being associated with CG literature was borne out by the interviews, as gardeners generally indicated a degree of interest in gardening. The gardeners did not associate their garden practices with ideas about continuity of cultural practices from their homeland; or about being able to share cultural practices with other cultures.