Erik Harms
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816656059
- eISBN:
- 9781452946245
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816656059.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This introductory chapter focuses on Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City. It describes how national tropes and cultural stereotypes about ...
More
This introductory chapter focuses on Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City. It describes how national tropes and cultural stereotypes about rural–urban relations persists in places like Hóc Môn despite the constant disruptions of an everyday existence that seems to depart so dramatically from the ideal. It discusses the idealization of the Vietnamese peasant as the source of Vietnamese tradition, which became further reified during the Vietnam War. It shows the ways in which the ideal categories of Vietnamese culture are simultaneously contradicted and reinforced through everyday social life. It attempts to understand the intersection of space, time, and power and the interplay between cultural ideals and everyday practices of most Hóc Môn residents.Less
This introductory chapter focuses on Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City. It describes how national tropes and cultural stereotypes about rural–urban relations persists in places like Hóc Môn despite the constant disruptions of an everyday existence that seems to depart so dramatically from the ideal. It discusses the idealization of the Vietnamese peasant as the source of Vietnamese tradition, which became further reified during the Vietnam War. It shows the ways in which the ideal categories of Vietnamese culture are simultaneously contradicted and reinforced through everyday social life. It attempts to understand the intersection of space, time, and power and the interplay between cultural ideals and everyday practices of most Hóc Môn residents.
Erik Harms
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816656059
- eISBN:
- 9781452946245
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816656059.003.0002
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter seeks to understand the persistent use of binary frameworks, such as rural versus urban and inside versus outside, to understand complex urban processes. It argues that social life in ...
More
This chapter seeks to understand the persistent use of binary frameworks, such as rural versus urban and inside versus outside, to understand complex urban processes. It argues that social life in Hóc Môn challenges and reproduces simplifying schemes for understanding Vietnamese spatial organization. It discusses that Vietnam is both capitalist and socialist, an agrarian nation constantly marked by an emphasis on urbanization and industrial development. It explores the conceptual and practical difficulties that arise when a place and the people who inhabit it must straddle symbolically opposed concepts. The chapter also examines in detail the ambivalence Hóc Môn residents associate with the current urbanization process in Ho Chi Minh City, linking this to the ways that people living on the fringes of the city fall between the spatial and temporal categories used to imagine the city.Less
This chapter seeks to understand the persistent use of binary frameworks, such as rural versus urban and inside versus outside, to understand complex urban processes. It argues that social life in Hóc Môn challenges and reproduces simplifying schemes for understanding Vietnamese spatial organization. It discusses that Vietnam is both capitalist and socialist, an agrarian nation constantly marked by an emphasis on urbanization and industrial development. It explores the conceptual and practical difficulties that arise when a place and the people who inhabit it must straddle symbolically opposed concepts. The chapter also examines in detail the ambivalence Hóc Môn residents associate with the current urbanization process in Ho Chi Minh City, linking this to the ways that people living on the fringes of the city fall between the spatial and temporal categories used to imagine the city.
Erik Harms
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816656059
- eISBN:
- 9781452946245
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816656059.003.0003
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter provides a thorough discussion of the conflation of order with progress, modernization, and development in Hóc Môn. It argues that people cannot see the material transformations and ...
More
This chapter provides a thorough discussion of the conflation of order with progress, modernization, and development in Hóc Môn. It argues that people cannot see the material transformations and social problems that develop out of the conflation of rural and urban spaces. In this conflation, the vegetable gardens suffer from poisonous run-off from the industries that surround them, and the rice fields are mined for soil that is carted to various parts of the district and into the inner city for use in filling the foundations of new construction projects. It explains that understanding life on the edge requires moving back and forth between the symbolic categories of space and the everyday experiences of lives lived within the space.Less
This chapter provides a thorough discussion of the conflation of order with progress, modernization, and development in Hóc Môn. It argues that people cannot see the material transformations and social problems that develop out of the conflation of rural and urban spaces. In this conflation, the vegetable gardens suffer from poisonous run-off from the industries that surround them, and the rice fields are mined for soil that is carted to various parts of the district and into the inner city for use in filling the foundations of new construction projects. It explains that understanding life on the edge requires moving back and forth between the symbolic categories of space and the everyday experiences of lives lived within the space.
Erik Harms
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816656059
- eISBN:
- 9781452946245
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816656059.003.0004
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter focuses on social change and social transformation in Hóc Môn. It argues that descriptions of Hóc Môn marked the edge as a mixture of orientation to time, a sensibility that combined a ...
More
This chapter focuses on social change and social transformation in Hóc Môn. It argues that descriptions of Hóc Môn marked the edge as a mixture of orientation to time, a sensibility that combined a distinct future orientation with a symbolically charged form of nostalgia described by scholars who have taken to calling Vietnam “the country of memory.” As local residents described it, Hóc Môn lay somewhere in the middle of this temporal mix of present, past, and future. The sense of place implied a sense of time as well as space. Descriptions of the here and now oscillated between a vanishing rural past and the vanguard of modernization.Less
This chapter focuses on social change and social transformation in Hóc Môn. It argues that descriptions of Hóc Môn marked the edge as a mixture of orientation to time, a sensibility that combined a distinct future orientation with a symbolically charged form of nostalgia described by scholars who have taken to calling Vietnam “the country of memory.” As local residents described it, Hóc Môn lay somewhere in the middle of this temporal mix of present, past, and future. The sense of place implied a sense of time as well as space. Descriptions of the here and now oscillated between a vanishing rural past and the vanguard of modernization.
Erik Harms
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816656059
- eISBN:
- 9781452946245
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816656059.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Much of the world’s population inhabits the urban fringe, an area that is neither fully rural nor urban. Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh ...
More
Much of the world’s population inhabits the urban fringe, an area that is neither fully rural nor urban. Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, epitomizes one of those places. This book explores life in Hóc Môn, putting forth a revealing perspective on how rapid urbanization impacts the people who live at the intersection of rural and urban worlds. Unlike the idealized Vietnamese model of urban space, Hóc Môn is between worlds, neither outside nor inside but always uncomfortably both. With particular attention to everyday social realities, the book demonstrates how living on the margin can be both alienating and empowering, as forces that exclude its denizens from power and privilege in the inner city are used to thwart the status quo on the rural edges. More than a local case study of urban change, this work also opens a window on Vietnam’s larger turn toward market socialism and the celebration of urbanization—transformations instructively linked to trends around the globe.Less
Much of the world’s population inhabits the urban fringe, an area that is neither fully rural nor urban. Hóc Môn, a district that lies along a key transport corridor on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, epitomizes one of those places. This book explores life in Hóc Môn, putting forth a revealing perspective on how rapid urbanization impacts the people who live at the intersection of rural and urban worlds. Unlike the idealized Vietnamese model of urban space, Hóc Môn is between worlds, neither outside nor inside but always uncomfortably both. With particular attention to everyday social realities, the book demonstrates how living on the margin can be both alienating and empowering, as forces that exclude its denizens from power and privilege in the inner city are used to thwart the status quo on the rural edges. More than a local case study of urban change, this work also opens a window on Vietnam’s larger turn toward market socialism and the celebration of urbanization—transformations instructively linked to trends around the globe.
