Theorizing and Conceptualizing Displacement
2.1 Theorizing and Conceptualizing Displacement in the Vietnamese Context
As noted in the Introduction, we will utilize the motif of displacement to theorize and conceptualize how the current Vietnamese diaspora relates to and/or transcends Vietnam’s migration history and experiences. The advantage of displacement is its numerous operative paradigms — that of a theoretical signifier, a textual strategy, and a lived experience — which will help us to contextualize and to characterize the various forms of diaspora across time and space. For example, displacement as a theoretical signifier will allow us to recognize the historical and political conditions that produce periods in which Vietnamese were displaced both internally and externally from their native culture and society; displacement as a textual strategy will provide us the opportunity to understand why Vietnamese may be “displaced but never replaced” though it remains a source of estrangement; and displacement as a lived experience will help us to conceptualize the relationship between displacement and the reconstruction of identity which is necessary for cultural survival and later, to assert and negotiate cultural and intellectual rights to put back the “place” into displacement.
We will begin with a necessary but brief survey of the concept of displacement and its relation to diaspora. This will ensure that our interpretation of displacement is not based on constructing the shape of the past to shape the present, but rather based on “following directions and messages provided” by the sources. [1] In addition, we will examine different “types of aggrandizement” that colonist powers engaged in expanding their control over colonized societies. This will allow us to outline the historical, political, and international conditions that have produced different types of colonial diasporas of which have had displacing effects on Vietnamese traditional society. Such outline will essentially draw our attention to a central theme in Vietnamese history: that is, Vietnamese as ‘victims,’ ‘localizers,’ and ‘resisters’ of the Chinese, French, and Japanese colonial diasporas; in later a blog, we will outline and analyze the Vietnamese colonial diaporas that had displaced other peoples, cultures, and states, including that of the Cham, Khmer, the former Republic of South Vietnam, and Cambodia.
Defining Displacement and its Relations with Diasporas
In defining displacement, we are fortunate to have Angelika Bammer’s succinct analytical definition: “The separation of people from their native culture either through physical dislocation (as refugees, immigrants, migrants, exiles or expatriates) or the colonizing imposition of a foreign culture.” [2] Bammer’s displacement signifies one of the most formative experiences — that of the human condition and conditions of knowledge — in the twentieth century, where over 30 million people were uprooted and forcibly moved as a result of Nazi policies and World War II; [3] overlapping with this is another 60-80 million refugees worldwide who have been cut off from their homelands since the end of the second war. Bammer also draws attention to “people who are not expelled from but displaced within their native culture by processes of external and internal colonization” but of which “no comparable counts or estimates exist.” [4] Though not all those under colonial rule can be said to be displaced. There is more certainty, however, that the cumulative effect of colonial policies in general:
the expropriation of land that often left indigenous peoples with merely a small, and mostly poorer, portion of their own land; the pass laws that controlled and regulated their physical movement; the economic shifts that forced them into the new centers of imperial employment thus creating new patterns of migratory labor; the presence of a foreign ruling power that disappropriated local cultures. [5]
In utilizing displacement as a theoretical signifier, we take liberty in further deconstructing (while remaining within the framework of) Bammer’s definition in two broad categories. The first is emigrants who are physically dislocated either “voluntary” or who are “forced”; that is not due to “colonizing imposition of a foreign culture” per se, but rather by the country’s own internal socioeconomic and political factors. [6] The second is those who are physically dislocated by the “colonizing imposition of a foreign culture,” which results in either their displacement from their native land/culture or their displacement within their native land/culture. [7]
For us, the importance of the above categories is that they assist in defining the concept of diaspora, providing a background in recognizing specifically the victim tradition and the colonial tradition of diaspora.
In the former, the displaced person can be considered a victim if he/she is forcibly and politically removed from (or he/she emigrates in the fear of being politically persecuted if he/she stays in) the native land/culture either by the country’s government or by colonial rule. When this occurs at “noticeable” human scale, such movement entails “the catastrophic origin, the forcible dispersal and the estrangement” of a people, which we term ‘victim diaspora.’ [8] Here, the victim diaspora is a subset of displacement, [9] or separate from the paragon of transnationalism, transmigration, or global capitalism. [10]
In the latter, the “colonizing imposition of a foreign culture” provides us a background to the tradition of the colonial diaspora in which the colonizers are dispersed widely in order to sow their seeds, to expand for and to further their imperial plans. Here, colonial diaspora allows us to recognize the effects of colonial rule on a society where a population is colonized and internally displaced, in which degrees of assimilation to the colonists’ culture, localization, and “creolization,” or resistantance to the colonists’ culture can occur, separate from the external displacement caused by colonial rule. [11]
Epistemologically, the colonial diaspora, or diaspora of active colonization, derives from Greek term diasperien, from dia-, “cross” and — sperien, “to sow or scatter seeds.” It was a predominate feature of the Greek diaspora, describing its colonization of Asia Minor and the Mediterranean from 800-600 B.C. For the Greeks, establishing their own diasporas abroad in general connotes a positive experience — expansion through plunder, military conquest, and migration. [12] Such diaspora of active colonization tradition was later followed by the British, Russians, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and French. [13]
By contrast, the origin of diaspora Jewish experience was marked by the destruction of Jerusalem in 568 B.C., which “created the central folk memory of the negative, victim diaspora tradition, emphasizing in particular the experience of enslavement, exile and displacement.” [14] This victim tradition later experienced by Africans, Armenians, Irish, and Palestinians — connotes afflictions of being isolated, insecure of living in a foreign place, adrift from their roots, and oppressed by an alien ruling class. [15] But we should also note that some groups can take dual or multiple forms, or even change their character over time. [16] As argued by Robert Cohen, victim diaspora, such as the Jews, whose origin can be regarded as such, can have an imperial phase, as is evident in the Zionist colonization of Palestine. [17]
The above, of course, indicates the opposing notions of victim diaspora and colonial diaspora. But rather than trying to resolve the opposing notions, [18] we may gain more by understanding the historical and political conditions that produce the colonial diaspora and victim diaspora, as well as by analyzing the dynamics and tension within and between them. For now, however, let us focus first on the impacts and effects of the colonial diasporas on their colonized societies.
This approach, or textual strategy, will allow us to later see displacement caused by colonial diasporas as one of the central themes in Vietnamese history in both classical and modern periods; in addition, it will also allow us to see Vietnamese as the “aggressors,” having their own colonial diasporas and having displaced other peoples, cultures, and states.
Types of Colonial Rule and their Effects on Displacement
Given that displacement caused by the “colonizing imposition of a foreign culture” by Western powers (hereinafter referred to as western colonial diasporas) had been one of the underlying themes in the twentieth century, we will focus on expansionist factors that help explain, in part, the impacts and effects of western colonial diasporas on their colonized societies, focusing on Asian countries.
We will briefly analyze these expansionist factors and postulate their displacing effects on Asian traditional societies. Our purpose, of course, is to utilize such analysis to detect and outline the various types of colonial rule (hereinafter referred to as colonial diaspora) that have taken form in Vietnam in both the classical and modern periods, as well as the colonial diaspora phases that Vietnam itself has taken on.
Again, we are fortunate to have Frank Darling’s study on the “westernization” or colonization of Asia. [19] His work identifies four “types of aggrandizement” in which western colonial diasporas have engaged in expanding their control to Asian traditional societies: 1) dynastic, 2) economic, 3) ideological, and 4) tutelary.
In short, dynastic aggrandizement is characterized as intensely personal and conducted in the name of the sovereign ruler, although such colonizations have been precarious and uncertain. [20] Economic aggrandizement took place when propensity to expand and acquire overseas colonies was motivated primarily by the desire to promote rapid economic development, which tended to result in a more stable colonial rule than the dynastic. [21] Ideological aggrandizement consisted of the extension of national power into colonial territories by an expansionist regime pursuing the goals of an abstract messianic doctrine but, like the dynastic, it was affected by the shifting political forces within the ruling expansionist regime; [22]and tutelary aggrandizement is characterized as the acquisition of colonial territories for the primary purpose of instructing the indigenous people in selected elements of the culture of the colonial power, which tended to result a relatively moderate and, once established, sought no additional territory. [23] There are, of course, various forms in each of the four types, and that each type is not exclusive; that is, a colonist can pursue numerous types of aggrandizement.
However, of course, the impacts of the purpose and scope in the above types of aggrandizement are interrelated with the geographical factors of the traditional society, such as the strategic location, physical size, and the duration of years of the traditional society. [24] “Where settlement for colonial or military purposes by one power occurred, an ‘imperial [colonial] diaspora’ can be said to have resulted,” as noted by Robert Cohen. [25] However, before any colonial diaspora can take place, there are usually linkages between the colonizer and the colonized. These linkages include military invasions, foreign missionaries, foreign traders, tribute missions, indigenous returnees, political exiles, and foreign communities. [26]
It is important to note that the recognized types of aggrandizement and their linkages have tended to operate within the context of time: unilateral-monopolistic timing (that is, the expansion occurred because of a “power vacuum” that essentially allowed a colonial power to monopolize a particular region and only limited by the available resources and voluntary restraints of that colonial power); and multilateral-competitive timing (that is, when the expansion of a new colonial power is confronted with opposition from one or more competing colonial powers). Of course, some countries were strong enough to prevent these foreign linkages to take full form and, thus, were able to confine a full-blown colonization. [27] But when colonial diasporas do take place, the indigenous population will produce a response, consisting of the reaction and replication of the indigenous people to the colonial impact. Of importance are the cultural, religious, and political systems of the traditional society; these are of significance in terms of its ability to resist or assimilate to the various colonist values and institutions. [28]
Although it will be very limited, the above analytical framework will come to light when we apply it to an actual case: the American colonization of the Philippines.
According to Frank Darling, American colonial policy in the Philippines consisted of tutelary aggrandizement goals, instructing the indigenous people on (but confining them) the formation of indigenous democratic political institutions modeled after those in the United States, which, in turn, involved the establishment of a supplementary American-oriented educational system. [29] The American colonization process tended to be erratic and constrained due to American domestic politics at the time regarding whether the nation should pursue expansionism or isolationism, but, nevertheless, it was the only Western power whose avowed purpose at the outset was its own liquidation. [30] In part, American tutelary aggrandizement was affected by multilateral-competitive timing. That is, the U.S. was pressured to rationalize its acquisition, rather than seeking a territorial extension of its power. [31] This form of timing contributed to the training of indigenous political leaders suitable for democratization in the Philippines. In part, Filipino leaders who took early consultative roles in the exercise of executive authority had produced a profound confidence and intensified the local desire for national independence, which “was one of the most important elements in the entire indigenous response.” [32]
As is evident, the passage of Tydings-McDuffie Act in 1934 provided a timetable for Philippine independence; in 1936, when the Philippine Commonwealth was created only a few American administrators were employed in educational and technical posts. [33] The idea of an efficient transfer of sovereignty to the Philippines could be traced to the Wilsonian concept of national self-determination promulgated at the end of WWI. In contrast to French rule in Indochina, the American form of colonial rule did prepare and transfer sovereignty to the Philippines via new political institutions modeled on the American constitutional system, and because the central issue was about the timing of national independence the Philippine nationalist movement was never suppressed. [34] Similarly, American social policy consisted of a dual purpose program of secular education to promote democratic norms and values to a mass electorate and to train indigenous elite to maintain a democratic society. In particular, the number of Filipino students who attended public school by 1922 (more than one million) was unprecedented by any Western colonial standard. [35] While the Philippine economy was largely dependent on the U.S. (the American economy consumed 75 percent of the Philippine exports while providing 85 percent of its imports), American economic policy did not uproot the Philippine agrarian economy.
However, at the same time, as argued by Mark Philip Bradley, the American “exceptionalist” colonial approach in the Philippines still “echoed the fundamental beliefs in racialized cultural hierarchies that underlay the broader American encounter with nonwhite peoples at home and abroad.” [36] And, as argued by Glenn May, American colonialism in the Philippines failed to “bring about fundamental change.” [37]
On the one hand, Darling’s comparative analysis may marginalize particular historical inputs as well as long-term displacing effects in order to invent a systematic framework that is able to compare and contrast the highly and multifaceted impacts of, and the indigenous response to, western colonial powers in Asian colonized societies. But for our purposes, such systematic framework will provide us a textual construct to outline the historical, political, and international conditions that have produced different types of colonial diasporas of which have had different displacing effects in Vietnamese history.
Outlining the Colonial Diasporas in Vietnamese History
As we noted earlier, there are two historical traditions of diaspora: that of victim diaspora and colonial diaspora. Here, we will focus on colonial diasporas and their effects on Vietnamese traditional society, the internal displacement of Vietnamese native culture. In the later blogs, we will discuss specific dimensions of displacement caused by colonial diasporas; outline and analyze the Vietnamese colonial diasporas that had displaced other peoples, cultures, and states, including that of the Cham, Khmer, the former Republic of South Vietnam, and Cambodia; and theorize and conceptualize the victim diaspora in Vietnamese history.
For now, we will briefly discuss the colonial diasporas in Vietnamese history, which will essentially draw our attention to a central theme in Vietnamese cultural identity. That is, Vietnamese as ‘victims,’ ‘localizers,’ and ‘resisters’ of the Chinese, French, and Japanese colonial diasporas.
There is today a consensus among Vietnam scholars that the ancestors of the Vietnamese had their own kings and cultural symbols long before the arrival of Chinese colonial powers (or what we will refer to as Chinese colonial diasporas), although when the ancient Vietnamese civilization originated and the degree of indigenous innovation and evolution are not known with certainty; and presumably, according to Keith Taylor, the continued existence of the Vietnamese indigenous civilization “would have been assured even if they had never heard of China.” [38]
Notwithstanding, from the beginning of recorded history in the third century B.C. (when Vietnamese culture and society for the first time were part of a kingdom, Nam Viet, encompassing all of southern China in 207 B.C.), to 939 A.D., Vietnamese culture and society had been thought of as a branch of Chinese civilization and empire who had been blessed with China’s “civilizing” influence. [39] It has even been thought that the reason Vietnamese society “was able for centuries to resist Chinese aggression” while all the neighboring states had become Chinese “was because it was the only one to have been subjected to government by a permanent Chinese administration…[which] gave [Vietnamese] a cohesion and formal structure which its neighbors lacked.” [40]
Conveniently, French intellectual support for its ‘mission civiliatrice’ drew on the observation that Vietnam was once relatively progressive and intelligent due to Chinese cultural influence, but of which had relapsed. Vietnam’s “imitativeness” became nothing more than a somewhat eccentric and stunted extension of China, according to this view. For French historians, after separating from China in 939, the Vietnamese made no progress on Chinese civilization throughout the centuries. Adrien Launay suggested that “the complete absence of progress that the Annamites [Vietnamese] had on Chinese civilization and the neglible development in the arts and sciences, far inferior to that of the Chinese” illustrated that without Chinese domination, “Giao-chi [northern Vietnam] of old times would have rested in savage tribal communities, just like the Muong who live on the frontiers of their country.” [41] By implication, Vietnamese, like other peoples, will “progress only when provided with the necessary stimulus: they require contact with people of a more refined culture.” [42]
However, the Vietnamese, as a result of their experience under Chinese rule, necessarily became expert survival artists. This is illustrated in Ngo Si Lien’s statement of how Vietnamese should respond to constant Chinese aggression:
South [Vietnam] and North [China], when strong or when weak, each has its time. When the North is weak, then we are strong, and when the North is strong, then we become weak; that is how things are. This being so, those who lead the country must train soldiers, repair transport, be prepared for surprise attacks, set up obstacles to defend the borders, use the ideas of a large country with the warriors of a small country…If an invasion is imminent, take words and negotiate, or offer gems and silk as tribute; if this does not succeed, then, though danger flood from every side, man the walls and fight the battles, vowing to resist until death and to die with the fatherland; in that case one need be ashamed of nothing. [43]
In fact, the “rebirth” of Vietnam after its independence was the birth of a spirit of resistance to the universal claims of Chinese power. Keith Talyor summarizes very well the advice of Ngo Si Lien to his fellow countrymen:
Vietnamese independence [will be] the result of commitments made by successive generations…It [will need] the collective decision of a society to risk danger for the sake of preserving its heritage. [44]
Also worthy of note is Ngo Si Lien’s advice on using “the ideas of a large country with the warriors of a small country.” Vietnamese were quite receptive to the intellectual trends in China and though imperfect have been able to reconcile their attraction to Chinese political ideas, social practices, literary fashions and technology with a truly passionate determination to preserve Vietnam’s independence. [45] Moreover, as noted by John Whitmore, there is a “Vietnamese cultural core” that is constant thought shifting entity, where foreign elements and ideologies would be able to graft onto it, but “the important fact is the Vietnamese ability to make any such ‘foreign-ness’ Vietnamese”; [46] thus, Vietnam is not the smaller, eccentric or stunted dragon.
Not unlike the dynastic scholars, Vietnamese intellectuals in the early twentieth century also saw it as their responsibility to fight against French imperialism. In fact, many of these intellectuals began to ask what they could learn from Europe and America. According to many of these scholars, to survive and to modernize, Vietnamese had to produce the talents, skills, and ideas of a Watt, Edison, Kant, and Rousseau, whose ideas were the sources of Western civilization, wealth and power. Some were also conscious and sought the example of Tagore and Ganhdi in overthrowing a western power while still achieving a fusion of eastern and western thoughts. Like Ngo Si Lien, Phan Boi Chau, a prominent scholar at the time, saw the necessity for Vietnamese, particularly women and soldiers, to be trained professionally and vocationally in the western ways in order to achieve modernization and independence from the French, bringing about a desire for progress and adventure, love and trust, virtue and heroism, no obnoxious mandarins, no dissatisfied citizens, no imperfect educational system, no neglected industry and no losing commercial activities. [47] After that, the West “will learn from us,” and that we “shall keep our own way of life,” declared Phan Boi Chau. [48]
However, as observed by John Whitmore, when new foreign elements are integrated to the indigenous’ own context and its own understanding of itself, this “will inevitably be imperfect and may lead to tension and stress within the society.” [49] That is, such fusion — such as Phan Boi Chau’s embrace of the West modernity but not its colonial rule — was completely incompatible to the Vietnamese communist intellectuals’ borrowing of the Marxist-Leninist thoughts, which was initially “set out to replace everything in the Vietnamese tradition” [50] with a significant degree of single-mindedness on rechanneling “people’s loyalties and obligations away from their own parochial interests to the party, revolution, and the collective” via institutional structures, civic rituals, and literacy. [51] This foreshadowed “the two Viet-Nams” of the Vietnam War.
Perhaps, the question for Vietnam, today under a communist regime, is “to ask now and in the future the contribution of Marxist ideology to Vietnamese culture in the same way that we ask it of Buddhism and Confucianism.” [52]
For a brief outline of particular colonial diasporas in and their displacing effects in Vietnamese history, see 3.1 Online Classroom which includes the Austroasiatic Colonial Diasporas (3000-1000 B.C.); Ou Yueh (Au Viet) Colonial Diaspora (257-207 B.C.); Chinese Diasporas (207 B.C. – 939 A.D.); French Colonial Diaspora (1862 -1954); and Japanese Diaspora (1941-1945).
- For a concise sketch of Vietnamese history before French colonization, read: John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986 (p.1-8).
- On the theme that Vietnamese could benefit from Chinese culture without themselves becoming Chinese, and of which also appeared to underlie later experiences with western colonial powers though such adaptation inevitably be imperfect and may lead to tension within the society, read: Alexander Woodside, Vietnamese History: Confucianism, Colonialism, and Independence, Vietnam Forum, Vol.11, 1988, (p.21-48).
- For a comparsion regarding the survival capacity (i.e. adatability/resistance, cohesiveness of societal structures, physical size and geographic location, and the duration of years of the traditional society) of Asian traditional societies in response to western colonist powers, read Frank Darling’s Chapter 4 in his The Westernization of Asia: A Comparative Political Analysis (Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1979).
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[1] O.W. Wolters, Two Essays on Dai Viet in the Fourteenth Century (New Haven: Yale Council on Southeast Asia Studies, 1988), p. ix.
[2] Angelika Bammer, Displacement: Cultural Identities in Question (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), p. xi.
[3] Ibid, p. xi.
[4] Ibid, p.xi.
[5] Ibid, p. xi-xii.
[6] It should be noted that the task of separating voluntary and involuntary migration is much more difficult in practice. There has also been a growing effort by scholars to differentiate migration cause by man-made disasters and migration cause by natural disasters.
[7] Today, the displaced person in either category who has crossed an international border and who falls under relevant international refugee law instruments maybe considered a refugee, whereas an internal displaced person in the second category is subjected to more tenuous international refugee law protection.
[8] Robert Cohen, Global Diasporas: An Introduction (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1997), p.177.
[9] According to Wanni Anderson and Robert Lee, “the relationship between the tropes of diaspora and transnational social practice can be understood bet as two related but often contradictory aspects or subsets of displacements.” See their Displacement and Diasporas: Asians in the Americas (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2005), p.10.
[10] Other scholars, however, argues diasporas are connected to and frequently marked by the flows of transnationalism, transmigration, and even global capitalism. Therefore, economic migrants or transmigrants can be considered diasporic and can inflect diasporic formulations. For example, many Asia sex workers travel to Japan on tourist visas and never return to their homeland for socioeconomic reasons. These workers become trapped by the pressures of family, nation, and economic necessity. Therefore, they are tied to their homeland via debt, family obligation, and statelessness. See Jana Evans Braziel and Anita Mannur, Theorizing Diaspora: A Reader (Mass.: Blackwell, 2003), p.11, 13.
[11] Robert Cohen, Global Diasporas, p.66.
[12] Ibid, p.66.
[13] Ibid, p.178.
[14] Robert Cohen, “Diasporas and the Nation-state: From Victims to Challengers,” International Affairs, Vol.72, No.3 (July, 1996), p.508.
[15] Ibid, 508.
[16] We are also fortunate to have Robert Cohen’s fluid typology of diaspora which consists of victim, labor, trade, imperial and cultural diasporas. We will later analyze this typology in more detail. See Cohen’s Global Diasporas: An Introduction.
[17] Robert Cohen, Global Diasporas, p.179.
[18] In general, this has been resolved by over centuries of advocacy by the victim diaspora’s experiences in which the heart of diaspora’s definition has become to mean a collective trauma of banishment, exile, and the longing to return home. However, Robin Cohen has argued the victim tradition is more complex and diverse. For example, diaspora’s experiences in modern nation-states have resulted in considerable intellectual and economic achievements. By implication, there is a need to transcend the victim tradition. See his Diasporas and the Nation-state: From Victims to Challengers, International Affairs, Vol.72, No.3 (July, 1996), 513.
[19] Frank Darling, The Westernization of Asia: A Comparative Political Analysis (Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1979).
[20] Ibid, p.105-106.
[21] Ibid, p.106-109.
[22] Ibid, p.109-110.
[23] Ibid, p.110-112.
[24] Ibid., p.79-87.
[25] Robert Cohen, Global Diasporas, p.66.
[26] Frank Darling, Westernization of Asia, p.63-71.
[27] Robert Cohen, Global Diasporas, p.65.
[28] Frank Darling, Westernization of Asia, p.3.
[29] Ibid., p.111.
[30] Ibid., p.111.
[31] Ibid., p.116.
[32] Ibid., p.286.
[33] Ibid., p.287.
[34] Ibid, p.121, 127.
[35] Ibid., p.143.
[36] Mark Philip Bradley, Imagining Vietnam and America: The Making of Postcolonial Vietnam, 1919-1950 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2000), p.6.
[37] Glenn May, Social Engineering in the Philippines: The Aims, Execution, and Impact of American Colonial Policy, 1900-1913 (Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1980).
[38] Keith Taylor, The Birth of Vietnam (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), p. xviii.
[39] Ibid., p. xvii.
[40] Keith Taylor, “An Evaluation of the Chinese Period in Vietnamese History,” The Journal of Asiatic Studies (Korea University), 23 (1980), p.139
[41] Cited in Nhung TuyetTran and Anthony Reid, Viet Nam: Borderless Histories (Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 2006), p.6.
[42] Cited in Victor Lieberman, Strange Parallels: Southeast Asia in Global Context (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p.8.
[43] Keith Taylor, Birth of Vietnam, p.301.
[44] Ibid., p.301.
[45] Alexander Woodside, “Vietnamese History: Confucianism, Colonialism and the Struggle for Independence,” The Vietnam Forum, Vol.11 (1986), p.23.
[46] John Whitmore, “Foreign Influences and the Vietnamese Cultural Core,” in D.R. SarDesai, Southeast Asian History: Essential Readings (Los Angeles: Westview Press, 2006), p.40.
[47] Chau Boi Phan, “The New Vietnam (1907),” in Truong Buu Lam, Colonialism Experienced: Vietnamese Writings on Colonialism, 1900-1931 (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 2003), pp.105-123.
[48] Ibid, p.109, 121.
[49] John Whitmore, “Foreign Influences,” p.125.
[50] Smith, Viet-Nam and the West, 152, 145.
[51] Malarney, Culture, Ritual and Revolution in Vietnam, p.55.
[52] John Whitmore, “Foreign Influences,” p.40.
Posts
so, after a very long blog, what is the question?
is it this, ‘Perhaps, the question for Vietnam, today under a communist regime, is “to ask now and in the future the contribution of Marxist ideology to Vietnamese culture in the same way that we ask it of Buddhism and Confucianism.’ ???
Vvo2:i think for those who blamed communism for their forcible separatation and external displacement (diaspora), this is a very important question for them. because the way communism has been implemented and “forced” upon the Vietnamese people, it is for them something to resist against.
vietnamese have always been quite receptive to outside/foreign ideas but there is an ancient tradition of adapting foreign ideas in order to progress without supplanting the “Vietnamese core culture.”
obviously, living most of my life in the u.s., i identify myself with Phan Boi Chau…
i was reading a text on vietnamese history by scholars of the former republic of vietnam (Vietnamese Realities), these scholars concluded their work by noting:
“That no one should be surprised that [in Vietnam past and present] Confucian pragmatism, Buddhist self-denial and Christian charity liver together in harmony and recruit so many adherents. Mostly, however, the existence of this mosaic of religions is a living tribute to the tolerance and generous spirit of the Vietnamese people” (Vietnamese Realities 1967, p.172).
not to be too preachy, the younger overseas Vietnamese generations should not take for granted that their parents (my parents included) were of the above tradition. such spirit may explain why Vietnamese refugees in their host societies were able to adapt to new ways and become successful without losing their “Vietnamese core,” at least among the first generation…
I just wanted to share something.
Vietnamese youths protesting Chinese took over 2 of our islands, and setting up government officials there.
I guess this is relate to the topic of ‘displace’ but not ‘replaced’.
http://www.sbtnhouston.net/ArticleDetail/tabid/125/aid/749/Default.aspx
“you might ask, whats the point of protest, it not gonna do anything.
well, if we keep quiet and let the chinese do this, who knows what is their next step.
the point of protest is to make it becomes a big issue in the media, let the world know. better than keep quiet.”
my question is
It is true to say that the dynastic scholar and 20th century intellectuals scholar fought the same war with different strategies , from the foreign countries. how?
To Vvo2:
Regarding VN’s sovereignty over Paracel Spratly islands, I found a website that have old maps of Vietnam that indicate these islands are within Vietnam’s sovereignty, at least at particular periods in Vietnam history. Visit: http://www.topix.com/forum/world/vietnam/TINPEULKSIGSQ6MEB
To thaimnguyen:
Regarding to the linkage between dyanstic scholars and scholars of the early twentieth century, it may be that traditionally Vietnamese have looked to the scholar-gentry class for guidance in times when the Vietnamese nation is “adrift in a stormy sea.”
In Phan Boi Chau’s times (early 20 century), many of them were the sons of Confucian scholars whose efforts via “can Vuong” (Aid the King) movement could not adequately response to the French conquest. Therefore, these intellectuals saw Confucius values alone would not be able to reverse “mat nuoc” (national extinction) and believed the rigid adherence to classical Chinese learning had prevented an international outlook.
In the 18th century, a well known-scholar of the time, Le Quy Don, forewarned about “tu do” (self-originating) when Vietnam was unified under the Tay Son brothers. He feared the function of “tu do” as a license for military infighting. He proposed the nation to follow “chi thanh” (total sincerity), where the individual is interrlated with everyting in the universe and where the individual could determine the properties of all the other parts and vice-versa.
In Ngo Si Lien’s times (15th century), he focused on Confucian ethics (rather than Buddhism and particular familial partices) in order to stabilize internal conflicts and to encourage court officials to be loyal to the new Le emperor and dynasty (1428-1776), so as to prevent another Chinese invasion. He also spoke about the need for collective action to resist the constant threat from China.
My question to you guys is that do you see any traces of the above values/oulook in the Vietnamese diasporic community today?
I read this chapter of the article.
John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986 (p.1-8).
The chapter quickly covers the history of Vietnam from the Hung kingdoms to the last Nguyen Dynasty that was controlled by the French.
Throughout history, Vietnamese were facing many external problems with the Chinese. It seems like all the Vietnamese were united to fight against the foreign enemy (the Chinese). It was a patriotic thing to do so. However, during the era of Trinh vs. Nguyen (Trịnh Nguyễn phân tranh) was where we see our people fought a civil war. A war between two dynasties within Vietnam. This was the point where Vietnam became weakening. It happened again between Tay-son and Nguyen dynasty during 1800s. And what made it worst was in each civil war an outside force (Chinese, Chams, Laos) was asked to aid one side to fight the other. This showed that there has always been a weakness among the Vietnamese. And it made the Vietnamese easy to manipulate by foreign countries.
On a different topic, after 1000 years of domination by the Chinese, the Vietnamese have adapted a lot from the Chinese. The Vietnamese bureaucracy, scholars, and styles were a mimic of Chinese. On a positive side, these adaptations helped Vietnam advanced.
Trying to follow the chronological timeline was very difficult, especially with all the confusing names. History has never been my expertise. I like reading about the struggles my homeland has been through and how it become what it is today. The reading gives us an informative lesson on how famous cities came about such as Ha Hoi, Hue, and Saigon. The history of dynasty and the religious influence was interesting. This article also gives us how the Tran’s dynasty to the Le’s dynasty to the Ho’s dynasty then to the Nguyen’s dynasty ruled Vietnam. Where was the Vo’s dynasty or how does the Vo’s dynasty formed? I was sad that I didn’t hear how my dynasty came about.
John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986
Trying to follow the chronological timeline was very difficult, especially with all the confusing names. History has never been my expertise. I like reading about the struggles my homeland has been through and how it become what it is today. The reading gives us an informative lesson on how famous cities came about such as Ha Hoi, Hue, and Saigon. The history of dynasty and the religious influence was interesting. This article also gives us how the Tran’s dynasty to the Le’s dynasty to the Ho’s dynasty then to the Nguyen’s dynasty ruled Vietnam. Where was the Vo’s dynasty or how does the Vo’s dynasty formed? I was sad that I didn’t hear how my dynasty came about.
John Whitmore’s outline of Vietnamese history before the French gave a good overview of Vietnamese history that spanned from the early cultures of Vietnam in the Red River Delta and the Hung Kings to the modern era Nguyen dynasty. This article discussed the major Vietnamese dynasties such as the Ly, Tran, Le, and Nguyen as well as major periods of Chinese occupations and major rebellions such the Trung sisters. During the dynasties, they adopted many Chinese customs concerning bureacratic management of government. We were also influenced by Confucian and Neo-Confucian ideologies that helped to maintain the dynasties for as long as they lasted. The major theme that I see throughout Vietnamese history is one of constant struggle and adaptation. There seems to not be great periods of prosperous peace for the Vietnamese people when they were an independent sovereignty. There were always threats of invasions from the big bad wolf, or dragon I should say from the north. When they weren’t fighting with the Chinese, the Viet lords and royalties fought each other for power. Perhaps human beings are creatures of struggle and Vietnamese is no exception. When I was in Vietnam, all the streets in Saigon were named after what I assumed were famous Vietnamese heroes but at that time I had no idea who they were such as Nguyen Trai and Tran Hung Dao. After reading this article, I now finally know! I wonder what the history of Vietnam would be like if the Middle kingdom did not invade and not meddle in the region. Would we be the displacer much more than the displaced? I also thought that Hue was the capital for all the dynasties but this was not the case as I found out!
John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986 (p.1-8).
John Whitmore’s essay dates back to about 4000 years ago in Vietnam’s history. Before France’s presence in Vietnam, the Chinese played the role of colonial rule. China contributed to Vietnam’s attributes through the introduction of the dynasty system, imperialism, and Buddhism. Soon enough, China’s renowned dynasties collasped and Vietnamese dynasties began to form such as Tran, Nguyen, Trinh, etc. Vietnam experienced numerous changes as rulers constantly changed as well as the applications of Neo-Confucian ideology and bureaucratic system. In the early centuries, Vietnam has managed to resist most of the colonialism forced on Vietnam and try to maintain independence through revolts like the Trung Sisters. Such resistance, however, began to cease as France and other European powers began to establish themselves in Vietnam. Thus, Vietnam will undergo even more diverse changes which will end a traditional system and start a new modern system.
I read John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986 (p.1-8).
Perhaps on other languages is more like a mutt than Vietnamese. The language was not identified as is its own a little more than 150 years ago. Like most small third world countries, Vietnam was established by nomads. The group lived in the northeast of China until the Chinese Empire expend to the Pacific Ocean. Even after migrating, to what is now Hanoi, the Chinese Empire ruling was too great to escape. Vietnamese at first was mainly consists of Austroasiatic and khmar (Cambodia), then under China dominance Vietnamese was morphed to another language called Han Viet. This gradually transformed to Han tu. After the liberation of the Chinese, the Vietnamese language went under another transformation. When French invaded Vietnam , the Vietnamese language adapted Latin alphabets and becomes Quoc Ngu which the language Vietnamese people we are using now a day.
John Whitmore’s outline gives us insight on Vietnam’s early history as to how a a formal rule slowly came together. He tells us how the Chinese influence the Vietnamese, the rise and decline of powers within vietnam.
According to the article, John Whitmore explained Vietnamese early history before French colonized Vietnam. John also explained how dynasties are formed such as Tran, and Nguyen’s dynasties. It also described how Chinese has influenced over Vietnamese culture over the years.
In John Whitmore, An Outline of Vietnamese History Before French Conquest, Vietnam Forum, Vol.8, 1986 (p.1-8), John Whitmore explains to the reader about the early history of Vietnam during the colonial rule of the Chinese. The sad history of Vietnam has been one of constant foriegn rule and influence, and the outline shows us how the Chinese how have changed Vietnam culturally during the Chinese rule.
John Whitmore gives a very intriguing explanation on early history before French colonization. Whitmore explains how the dynasties, such as the Tran, Le, and Nguyen dynasties are intertwined within the Vietnamese society. It also shows Chinese influence to the Vietnamese culture through difussion.
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According to the article, John Whitmore explained Vietnamese early history before French colonized Vietnam. John also explained how dynasties are formed such as Tran, and Nguyen’s dynasties. It also described how Chinese has influenced over Vietnamese culture over the years.
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This article is extremely interesting. However, it is so filled with information that it is a little tricky to read it all at once without going to read some outside references. I’m totally bookmarking this to come back to it from time to time…
Trying to follow the chronological timeline was very difficult, especially with all the confusing names. History has never been my expertise. I like reading about the struggles my homeland has been through and how it become what it is today. The reading gives us an informative lesson on how famous cities came about such as Ha Hoi, Hue, and Saigon. The history of dynasty and the religious influence was interesting.
I agree with tiger willis, the article is a little tricky, for me as a lawyer it was very interesting and challenging but for the average reader it will be a little too challenging, for my humble opinion.
may be a check list with the most important points could be interpreted more easily by starters.