The Spirit of Phù Đổng and Anti-Folk Stories
I’ve been engaged in a long discussion on Facebook about, among other things, the story of a Vietnamese spirit in Phù Đổng village known in as Saint Gióng (Thánh Gióng)…
Oral Traditions on Borneo and in the Red River Delta
I’ve been having a long (and very productive) discussion with someone about an early Vietnamese text – the 15th-century – Lĩnh Nam chích quái liệt truyện (the Arrayed Tales of…
Romantic Nationalism in 1950s North Vietnam
A friend recently pointed out to me that there is an article that North Vietnamese historian Trần Huy Liệu wrote in 1956 that more or less set the guidelines by…
Texts, Archaeological Evidence and Vague Language
I’m reading a book on the emergence of “early states” (nhà nước sơ khai) in the Red River Delta. This book claims to be based on archaeological evidence, but what…
Early History and Multidisciplinary Scholarship in Vietnam
Several decades ago in North America it was common for archaeologists to use historical texts to interpret and explain their findings. Then archaeologists started to realize that many historical texts…
Drunk Russians and Loyal Natives in 1901 Singapore
I was looking at some documents from the Straits Settlements that are held in the Colonial Office in London and came across some letters and other documents related to the…
Staying Dreamflower-Fresh in 1954 Burma
I came across these images in some 1954 issues of The New Light of Burma newspaper. They are for Pond’s products, such as talcum powder, lipstick and “dreamflower powder.” Sprinkling…
The Views of Moderate Cochinchinese in 1946
On March 6, 1946, President of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam Hồ Chí Minh and Special Envoy of France Jean Sainteny signed an agreement that declared Vietnam to be a…
Sinicization and Hán Hóa
I’ve been doing some reading on the concept of Sinicization. It’s interesting to see that while the term has been widely used, very little effort (until recently) has been done…
Representing a Perfect Society in Early-1960s North Vietnam
Having posted some pictures from the South Vietnamese magazine, Vietnam Fights and Builds, from the 1960s, here are some images from a similar magazine from the same time period from…