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[This
paper is translated from french by Duy Tâm.]
Rethinking the Status of Vietnamese Women
in Folklore and oral History
Modernity and Women's Quest for Equal Rights
Decades later, under
French colonial
power, Vietnamese women embraced modernity with their already
historical gains and cultural practices. At the turn of the
twenty-century, the Franco-Vietnamese education, and the media, both
contributed to major changes in Vietnamese society. These two agents
of modernity, although limited in Vietnam
and under the control of French colonial authority, did provide
Vietnamese women with social and political spaces, which were
traditionally dominated by men.
By 1920, many
Vietnamese women held
granted university degrees and eleven of them granted fellowship to
study in France. In Paris in 1935, Hoang Thi Nga, of Hanoi, is the
first Vietnamese person to receive a Ph.D. in sciences
from a French university. In the past, under ancient dynasties, women
were not event allow to participate in the mandarinal examinations.
These examinations gave men status and social recognition granting
the brightest graduates the privilege to have a stone stele in the
literature temple in Hanoi.
In 1936, after the
election in France
of the Popular Front party, and during the period of high
expectations for social change, Vietnamese women activists created a
committee to write a "guest book" in each city, Hanoi,
Saigon, and Hue, during the months of August and September. This new
form of activism among Vietnamese women was praised in the editorial
column of the newspaper
Dan Ba
Moi written by Nguyen Thi Kiem, a journalist well known by
her readers. The title of the article shows a great deal of cynicism
"The building of the Indochinese congress. For the first time
women of three regions have found ways to meet in order to engage in
politics
."
But Nguyen Thi Kiem had no illusion when she wrote: "To
engage in politics is to work at the highest spheres of power in
order to claim equal rights for a group of people that one is
representing or one hopes to represent. In a way its true meaning is
to be able to "engage in politics" in any countries of the
world. But in our country, which is under colonial power, its meaning
is very limited. What do we have to defend and claim as rights? In
our country to engage in politics is to accumulate testimonies, take
pictures to document our misery so we can beg for a little bit more
to French authority. And we don't even get much opportunities to do
just that. It is why there is no difference between Vietnamese men
and women when they engage in politics."
But of
course, these opinions could not have been expressed if there was no
newspapers to support women's rights. In Vietnam, during the period
of 1929-1936 there were three feminist newspapers or at least
newspapers which supported women's rights. There are:
Phu
nu tân van published in Saigon from 1929 to1934 ;
Phu nu thoi dam published
in Hanoi from 1930 to1934 ;
Dan
ba moi published in Saigon from 1934 to1936.
The
number of copies for each of these publications were quite
astonishing at the time: 2000 copies for
Dan
Ba moi, 6000 copies for
Phu
nu thoi dam and 8500 copies for
Phu
nu tan van
. For instance, as comparison measure, in 1936 there were 111.000
people living in Saigon and 149.000 people in Hanoi .
These weekly newspapers were written for both man and woman readers.
All the topics were of general social interests to both genders and
include topics on pre-marital virginity and early marriage; polygamy
and widows're-marriage; and romantic love and free choice in a
spouse. In other word Vietnamese women were claiming their equal
rights in a male society. The interest of these newspapers was that
they challenged a male society in which men were not only at the
center but had supreme power. And in the same time these newspapers
initiated dialogues by giving special columns in which readers could
express themselves. In other words they created a platform for opened
discussion which in turn contributed to the intellectual endowment.
In addition, male writers were also supporting women's rights. The
publication of
To Tam,
a romantic novel, by Hoang Ngoc Phach, former student of L Ecole
Normal Superieure of Hanoi. Ten years later in his novel
Doan
Tuyet (the break), the writer Nhat Linh, alias Nguyen
Tuong Tam, saved a woman from an abusive family. The Vietnamese
family, a representation of Confucius society was contested by the
women movement. In any event, the
participation of
Vietnamese women in the political arena was not simply a product of
Vietnamese history. Vietnamese women, at the time, were also
supported and encouraged by other women's movements around the world
in particular in China an in the Western countries. On the other
hand, one could have argued that this new frenzy of liberation had
also a down side. In 1930, weekly newspapers in Hanoi constantly
published the rising number of suicides among Vietnamese women. The
small lake was renamed as the grave of beauty,
Mo hong nhan.
But in reality these tragedies which provoked high emotions among the
readers was not as abnormal as the media presented it. In fact the
level of suicides in Hanoi for both men and women was relatively low
in comparison to the one in Europe at the same period of time. There
were 2,7 suicides for 100.000 people, and in France there were 20,2
suicides for 100.000 people. Thus public opinion was very much
influenced by the media s' dramatization of this current events.
By1930,
among Vietnamese women who brought women's issues on the Vietnamese
national political agenda were Dam Phuong, Nguyen Thi Kiem, Thuy An,
Nguyen Thi Khang
It is also important to note that this
Vietnamese feminist movement was limited to urban boundaries of the
cities of Hanoi and Saigon. The life of the majority of Vietnamese
peasants was far removed from urban concerns and political debates,
and was still dictated by cultural patterns of previous generations. It
does not mean, however, that the Vietnamese women in the
countryside were totally submissive to men's authority. In the
contrary, only a few privileged people who wanted to imitate urban
cultural life style, followed Confucian cultural practices. On the
other hand, the majority of peasants women worked side by side with
men in the fields and enjoyed some levels of equality. Such equality
was derived from their rural mode of substance. In villages,
religious practices were respected and have a significant impact on
gender relations. For instance, during religious holidays, women
often went for a two to three day trip to visit a distant pagoda. Men
stayed home and had not problems about their wives going without
them with other woman friends or relatives. This is another example
how Vietnamese women had gained and claimed some rights
and independance throughout history.
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