what are the main characteristics of vietnamese history culture

On the other hand, Vietnamese culture also acquired Hinduisation, for example, My Son Holy Land in the central Vietnam.- Thirdly, Vietnamese history & culture has 2 cycles of civilizatio

1 What are the main characteristics of Vietnamese

History & Culture?

- Firstly, Vietnam has a long history filled with a lot of wars,

especially resistant wars against foreign invaders During the VanLang – Au Lac civilization, Chao To conquered Au Lac in 179BCand then established Nan Yue Kingdom until 111BC when Han Dynasty replaced, starting 10 centuries of Chinese domination During this period, there were a lot of Vietnamese people’s uprisings against Chinese ruler such as uprising 2 sister Trung,

Ms Trieu, Phung Hung, Ly Bi, Trieu Quang Phuc, … Finally, in 938AD, Ngo Quyen defeated Southern Han troops on Bach DangRiver, beginning an independent era of our country After that, there was a civil war between 12 warlords until Dinh Bo Linh unified the country In the Earlier Le Dynasty, Le Hoan defeated Sung troops from China After that, our army won against 0.5 million Mongolian – Yuan troops when they attacked our country

3 times during Tran Dynasty Later, Le Loi swept out Ming troops, established Later Le Dynasty in 1427-1428 However, in the next period, Vienam faced a national division into Northern Court, ruled by the Mac and Southern Court, ruled by the Le When Mac collapsed in 1592, civil wars and peasant wars took place, the most significant one is Trinh – Nguyen War, which finally ended in the 18th century when 3 Tay Son brothers stood

up In 1788 – 1789, Nguyen Hue defeated 290,000 Tsing troops, only 5,000 survived, starting Tay Son Dynasty In 1858, Vietnam was attacked by French colonials While fighting against the French, our army also had to face 200,000 Tuong Gioi Thach troops from China From 1846 to 1954, there was Indochina War which was a resistant war against French imperialism Soon after

we defeated the French, we immediately faced The Vietnam War – which was a resistant war against American for nation

salvation The final general offensive and uprising 1975 totally defeated the Neo-colonialism and unified our country After seizing independence, Vietnam armies faced Southwest Border

War and fought against 600,000 Chinese troops in 1979 Up until now, we still have to fight over sea territory against China

- Secondly, Vietnam has special culture which has acculturation,

or, cultural exchanges The most important exchanges are

Sinicization and DeSinicization - the process whereby non-Han Chinese societies come under the influences of dominant Han Chinese state and society and conversely, the elimination of Chinese influences Sinicization includes normal exchanges and compulsory exchanges – which were the result of Chinese

assimilation during 1000 years of Chinese domination However, Vietnam also went Desinicized, which means choosing the bets toimprove For example, Vietnamese people did not completely useHan scripts but changing to Nom scripts, which was based on Chinese but included newly invented characters meant to

represent native Vietnamese words Moreover, we even

pronounced in Han – Vietnamese Another acculturation is Westernization and Dewesternization, which started from the 16th

century until now Like Sinicization, Westernization also had normal and compulsory exchanges, including the adoption of the Latin alphabet and the spread of Catholicism and Protestantism – which soon became a new religion in Vietnam Meanwhile, Dewesternization was shown through the process of how

Vietnamese people build the structure of university and educationsystem We learnt to apply Western technology Art and music was also affected Some foreign words that we borrowed from Western languages were Vietnamized in pronunciation Marxism was approved and adapted through Ho Chi Minh ideology

Currently, Vietnam is in the process of Dewesternization to build

up modern Vietnamese culture with Vietnamese identity On the other hand, Vietnamese culture also acquired Hinduisation, for example, My Son Holy Land in the central Vietnam

- Thirdly, Vietnamese history & culture has 2 cycles of

civilization The 1st one is Red River civilization, or Van Lang –

Au Lac civilization, a civilization is full of cultural achievements.Van Lang and Au Lac were the 2 first states of Vietnamese

people The reunion of tribes showed that we already had enough differentiations of classes and enough strength to control and build up cannel along the Red River If there had been no Van Lang – Au Lac civilization, there would be no Vietnam today This civilization formed and built up the fundamental foundation

of Vietnamese identity of Vietnamese culture After it collapsed, the country experienced 10 centuries of Chinese domination However, with the winning of Ngo Quyen in 938 against

Southern Han on Bach Dang River, the 2nd era of Vietnamese civilization started as Great Viet/ Dai Viet civilization during Ly –Tran – Later Le Dynasty This civilization created a lot of new things Without Dai Viet civilization, there would be no Vietnam today too Its collapse in the 16th century resulted in division, civil wars and peasant wars After that, Vietnam was put under colonization, bringing about the impoverishing living standard After the Doi Moi Policy in 1986, Vietnamese people hope to return to civilization with the new establishment of Vietnamese Socialist

- Finally, anothermain characteristic is that Vietnamese history

& culture has special development of socio-economic formation For instant, compared with European world which went through primitive communist, slave-owning mode of production,

federalism and capitalism, Vietnamese world also started with primitive communist, but then continued with Asiatic mode of production, federalism and then semi-feudal colonial society along with colonial capitalism European culture had seeds of new society in old society, while remains of old society still existed in new society, but they only lasted for a short time then stopped completely Meanwhile, Vietnamese socio-economic formation did not stop at any particular time All mode of

productions continuously existed throughout the history of the country up until 1945 For example, primitive society was still onsome mountainous areas There were no landlords, just rich and poor people In other words, Vietnamese world experienced multi-mode of production

2 What were relations between the Red River civilization and the formation of Vietnamese identity?

- A country’s identity is the most distinguished element in culture,including changeable and unchangeable values Vietnamese

identity includes 4 characteristics Firstly, Vietnamese people

have deep community mind Living as a community, Vietnamese people had strong and deep nationalism and patriotism They treasured family values, village values and country values

Secondly, Vietnamese identity includes flexibility and synthesis

In other words, they are open-mindedness, Vietnamese people had no conservativeness, dogmatism, xenophobia and

segregation Besides, they were known to had tolerance,

especially religious tolerance As we know, there were no

religious wars throughout the entire Vietnamese history

Vietnamese followed & respected, waiting for a favorable

moment to upset For example, in politics and military, when the Vietnamese defeated an army, we sent delegation to excuse, organized diplomatic talk and established the reasons for the army to withdraw, … Another example in religion is that the Vietnamese combined religions under Ly – Tran Dynasty When aVietnamese person shouted “Trời Phật ơi” – it included the three religions: Taoism, Confucianism and Buddhism in just one

phrase Thirdly, there was deep sentimentalism among the

Vietnamese Relations between people was based on cooperation,

no friends means no cooperation They also used family position

to call the society, such as addressing older women as aunts,

older men as uncles, etc Finally, in Vietnamese identity, we paid

full respect to women We called “cái” (female) for the biggest part such as “Sông Cái” (Big river), “ngón cái” (thumb), … We

also called Bà Điểm, Bà Quẹo, Hai Bà Trưng, … to show respect for women

- From the 8th century BC to the 2nd century BC, Van Lang and AuLac culture together formed the Red River civilization, along with its identity There were a lot of relations between the Red River civilization and the formation of Vietnamese identity

 Even though it was not a nation yet, just only a strong ethnic group with national orientation, but it was the primary or starting factor for nationalism later Rising from the needs of controlling water from Red River, ancient Viet tribes were needed

to unify and make solidarity in order to survive Wars and

conflicts between primitive tribes taking place during that period leaded to the reunion of Viet tribes Also, archeologists has found many weapons in ancient tombs, which shows that ancient Viet people believed that they could use in another world Unlike ancient communes such as Greek and Latin ones and German commune, Red River civilization was based on Asiatic commune,which had only public ownership of land and had no private ownership This resulted in the social stratification as a

community, forming the deep community mind of Vietnamese identity

 Also, the cultural exchanges during the Red River

civilization formed the flexibility and synthesis of Vietnamese identity Its culture was influenced from North China and

Southeast Asia, making a cultural combination and diversity RedRiver civilization is a result of combination and cultural

exchanges in history Vietnamese could not survive without exchanges

 At that time, hunting and farming were Viet people’s basicmethods to earn their living The agricultural culture formed the

deep sentimentalism among Vietnamese people, which was the foundation of the formation of Vietnamese identity

 On the other hand, with the long domination of Matriarchy

in the previous time, the formation of Vietnamese identity

brought about the respect for women

- All of these things combined together and founded the

formation of Vietnamese identity Before Chinese domination, Vietnamese had had already independent culture and diversified civilization

3 What were the processes of Sinicization and

DeSinicization during over 10 centuries of Chinese

domination (Explain why the Vietnamese people could reserve Vietnamese identity after over 10 centuries of Chinese domination)

- In theory, Sinicization means Chinalization – the process

whereby non-Han Chinese societies come under the influences ofdominant Han Chinese state and society In the contrast,

DeSinicization is the elimination of Chinese influences The combination of these 2 process are called cultural exchanges – a rule for cultural development In culturology and socio-cultural anthropology, this is a special category

- Sinicization and DeSinicization were resulted from the Chinese domination in Vietnam over 10 centuries During and after this period, Vietnamese people could still reserve Vietnamese identitybecause they knew how to practice special acculturation When Chao To conquered Au Lac in 179BC and Han Dynasty ruled the country in 111BC, Vietnam was divided into administrative sub units, named as Chiao Chih (Giao Chỉ) and Chiu Chen (Cửu Chân), which belonged to Chiao Chou (Giao Châu) Later,

Vietnam was called An Nam Colonial district While ruling

Vietnam, Chinese enacted some policies They carried out

bloody suppression in politics and military by hegemonism and ethnic cleasing They used Vietnamese people to rule Vietnamesepeople in the 2 controlled Chinese districts and autonomies of Vietnam in villages – which could not be controlled by the

Chinese but the Vietnamese They still kept the old system that Vietnamese people used in the previous time – having Military functionary and Literature under the chief Moreover, the Chineserulers conducted economic exploitation – which was part of their

“feudalist colonialism” They also enacted immigration policy, which means bringing the Chinese to Vietnam to live, including prisoners, peasants, soldiers, intellectuals, officials, landlords, merchants, …) More seriously, the Chinese did the cultural assimilation over Vietnam Vietnamese people had to learn

Chinese writings, wear Chinese clothes, … Until that time, Vietnam had only 2 groups surviving: Au Viet & Lac Viet, the remaining 98% had been assimilated by the Chinese In other words, Vietnamese people knew how to desinicize

- Even though Vietnamese could not keep the race identity

(material), we could still keep the cultural identity (mental) For the Sinicization, Vietnamese people experienced both normal exchanges and compulsory exchanges Normal exchanges, whichmeans positive sides, were shown as how Vietnamese learnt Chinese, but Chinese also learnt Vietnamese In history, no exchange means no development Therefore, everyone was free

to choose, everyone has the equal opportunity to learn together However, there were also compulsory exchanges, which are known as assimilation - Chinese authority wanted to assimilate Vietnamese into Chinese Likewise, by DeSinicization,

Vietnamese people not only experienced normal exchanges by accepting, receiving, improving and adapting selectively, but alsostruggling against assimilation through compulsory exchanges

- The processes of Sinicization and DeSinicization took place mainly on language and religion – the most 2 important elements

of an identity or a culture In regard to language, Chinese wanted

to destroy Vietnamese spoken language However, Vietnamese soon practiced the DeSinicization by selecting the best to

improve We accepted and learnt Han script but still kept

Vietnamese spoken language in the villages We pronounced Han script in Vietnamese way, which was called Han – Viet

pronunciation We created our own national words For example,

we did not called the moon as “nguyệt” like the original Chinese but “trăng” Vietnamese people did not completely use Han scripts but changing to Nom scripts, which was based on Chinesebut included newly invented characters meant to represent native Vietnamese words This is also a way to enrich Vietnamese vocabulary

- In the aspect of religion, the process of Sinicization and

DeSinicization was shown as a combination of Confucianism, Taoism and Chinese Buddhism We accepted and selected

advantages to follow For example, Confucianism affected most

in education and politics Vietnamese people respected

intellectuals or learning We gave prominence to social bonds such as “Tam cương” (the relationship between emperor and servant, father and son, husband and wife) and “Ngũ

thường”/Five Virtues (humanism, etiquette, loyalty, intelligence and sincerity) However, Vietnamese people did not follow the idea of not respecting manual labor and women in Confucianism,since we considered “first my wife, second my heaven” (“nhất vợnhì trời”) in daily cultural dialogues Vietnamese people mainly followed Buddhism, parts of it came from Chinese as Phật, the remaining came directly from India as Bụt We created new and unique combination of 3 religions, known as “Tam giáo đồng

nguyên” We leant Chinese orders and centralized monarchy court

- The result of Sinicization and DeSinicization has some

significances to Vietnamese culture It was the best way to keep Vietnamese indentity, the best way to develop, to be diversified more and more, the best way to enrich Vietnamese culture This

is the foundation for the 2nd era of Vietnamese civilization – Dai Viet/Great Viet civilization

4 What were the formation and development of Đại Việt civilization under Lý – Trần Dynasty?

- Đại Việt civilization was formed under 3 historical needs: political, cultural and socio-economic

 Under political conditions, after more than 10 centuries of Chinese domination, Vietnamese people need to protect and defend sovereignty and independence Therefore, reunification and solidarity are the most important conditions to prevent losing independence again when facing the danger of Chinese’s

conquer Moreover, we also had to struggle against

decentralization, which was the autonomy of villages and

centralization, which was the reunion of villages and tribes In

968, After Đinh Bộ Lĩnh stopped the anarchy of 12 warlords and unified the country, we needed the strongest state, so we could not use Văn Lang – Âu Lạc structure As a result, we learnt the Chinese model in politics: we needed a centralized monarchy, in which the emperor was the son of the heaven with absolute power to decide everything Besides, we needed the strongest army to fight against enemies For example, Lê Hoàn defeated Sung army and established Earlier Lê Dynasty in 981 A perfect centralized monarchy was the most important condition for Lý – Trần civilization

 Under cultural conditions, Văn Lang – Âu Lạc origins continued to be kept Community minds and filial piety (chữ

“Hiếu”) existed along with results of exchanges – the culture forming after 10 centuries Until Lý – Trần Dynasty, it was the combination of origins and creation that formed the cultural needs for Đại Việt civilization

 Under socio-economic conditions, we had a wet rice agriculture, which was a system of canals and dams to control water The Asiatic mode of production in our country before meant there was no private ownership, only public ownership existed After 10 centuries of Chinese domination, Chinese

landlords had private ownership but the number was very small, and Vietnamese landlords were even fewer Therefore, at the 10th

century, public ownership accounted for ¾ of the area Under Lý – Trần Dynasty, we inherited, continued and developed capacity for wet rice agriculture, which included labor, productivity, … tillthe 16th century when Đại Việt civilization collapsed and caused famine and death of starvation

- The development of Đại Việt civilization was the top

achievement of culture in terms of both material and intellectual (or mental or spiritual) aspects

 Under material content, we built 10,000 kilometers of canals in North VN, which still exists until now Thăng Long imperial citadel was 40 km2 in total In architecture, we built One Pillar Pagoda, Phổ Minh Temple, Quy Điền Tower, … In

handicrafts, we had Bát Tràng village which was specialized in pottery, and many other villages with specialization in ceramics, textile, bronze casting techniques, … We also developed on-watertransportation This was the top development of wet rice

agriculture with high capacity of production

 Meanwhile, the intellectual content was the most

important The tolerance of religions in our country meant there

was a combination of 3 religions: Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism 3 within 1, 1 within 3 Vietnamese mind, spirit,

sentimental feelings were influenced by Buddhism while

Vietnamese education, politics and social relations were based onConfucianism, with 3 social bonds: Emperor – servant, father – son, husband – wife and 5 virtues: benevolence, righteousness, priority, intelligence and sincerity Meanwhile, Taoism affected Vietnamese attitude to nature, in which people enjoyed living together with the nature We selected the best ones from 3

religions to form Vietnamese identity Lý Anh Tông established the school of 3 religions and taught simultaneously Monks of 3 religions could be officials Moreover, these 3 religions also had influences in poetry and literature Buddhism was applied in many areas, such as military arts In addition, we had a deep, special and unique nationalism, including a special art of politicalart and military art to ensure national solidarity Political art featured some special relationships: general – army such as Trần Hưng Đạo, emperor – officials formed a royal family, and a good relation between majority and minority under political marriages between princesses and chiefs of minorities Military art

consisted of diplomatic measures, segregation and use of guerilla and regular armies to defeat Mongolians For the law, we had writing court and criminal court In education, we established the

1st school named Quốc Tử Giám

In conclusion, if there had been no Đại Việt civilization, there would be no Vietnam today Later generations continue to inherit

a lot from Đại Việt civilization

5 What were the socio – economic, political

transformation during the period of 15th – 18th century?

First, we take a look at historical background In 1400, Hồ

Dynasty was established until 1408 when Ming army invaded our

country In 1428, Lê Lợi defeated them and established Later Lê Dynasty In 1527 Mạc Đăng Dung usurped the throne of Lê emperors Shortly after this, in 1533 Đại Việt was divided into 2 parts: the Northern Court ruled by Mạc and Southern Court of Lê emperors controlled by Nguyễn Kim In 1558, Nguyễn Hoàng went to the south, which he wanted to build up the southern area

In 1592, Southern Court defeated Northern Court, continuing the division of the country with Trịnh lords in the North and Nguyễn lords in the South From 1627 to 1672 there were civil wars with GianhRiver was the boundary between 2 regions Starting from

1771 in Quy Nhơn, Nguyễn Nhạc, NguyễnHụê and Nguyễn Lữ began the uprising Then in 1785, Tây Sơn army had Rạch Gầm –Xoài Mút victory, defeated 50,000 Siamese troops After

defeating Nguyễn, in 1786, Tây Sơn army passed GianhRiver anddefeated Trịnh In November 1788, 290.000 Tsing troops headed

by Soun Che Y came directly to Thăng Long citadel In

December 1788, Nguyễn Huệ proclaimed himself as the new emperor and made a counter-attack Only 5000 Tsing troops werealive New dynasty was established, which meant new

feudalization started until 1792 when Quang Trung died

However, in the south, Nguyễn Ánh recovered force and made a counter – attack the north until 1802 when Tây Sơn collapsed while Nguyễn Ánh took the throne and established Nguyễn Dynasty In late 18th century, the territory was as the present day

by clearing the land

The political changes during the period of 15th – 18th century had both negative side and negative side For the negative side, the most severe one was the division of the country into northern partand souther part during 3 centuries According to the historical law, reunion makes a country stronger and stronger; in contrast, division makes it weaker and weaker In addition, there were civilwars among feudalist groups such as Mạc - Nguyễn Kim, Trịnh -

Nguyễn, Tây Sơn - Nguyễn Ánh Meanwhile, the positive side features peasant movements during 16th – 18th century The strongest development of peasant movements was peasant wars when 3 Tây Sơn brothers stood up to defeated Trịnh - Nguyễn and Tsing army The reason for peasant wars was the

contradiction notables, landlords, which were the collapse of political regimes, and peasants The significances of peasant warsincluded 3 ideas First, they were dynamics for changing society Second, Tây Sơn won feudalism while before, peasants were limited However, peasants did not know how historical rule to form a new society After the winning, Tây Sơn built up and established Tây Sơn Court - Tây Sơn feudalism, but peasants could not represent mode of production Third, we recognized and overcame historical limitation Tây Sơn movements fought for both class interest and national interest Not only did they stopped the deeper reasons for national division by destroying Trịnh - Nguyễn but they defeated foreign invaders (Siamess and Tsing army)

The socio – economic changes included land ownerships or land tenure From 11th to 15th century, public ownership dominated 2/3

of the land, while private land only accounted for 1/3 Public landincluded state-owning land and communal land; private land owners included landlords and small peasants However, in 18th

century, there were changes in direction of decreasing public landand increasing private land 2/3 of public land reduced to only 1/3 The increase of small peasants and landlords was positive However, the peasant movements could not answer the question:

“What were the historical needs?” No class understood “a cry for land”, which was also “land to the tiller” As a result, history failed into crisis

In addition, there were new factors in society Seeds of capitalismappeared, which was higher development of “commodity

economics”, and seeds of wage labor The establishment of handicrafts factories was the sign of differentiation of classes However, these elements were very small, and they developed very slowly or even did not develop The reason for this was the conservativeness of multi-mode production and feudalism Poor peasants did not dare to leave the villages or avoid feudalism They continued to stay in the villages because of communal land,

as for every 6 years, communal land was redistributed and given

to peasants, unlike European case when peasants left to form factories This caused a stagnation of the seeds of capitalism for along time

Socially, the structure of classes also experienced some changes

In the 18th century, the number of notables decreased significantlywhile landlords increased very fast, along with tenants and small peasants However, there was a deep contradiction between landlords and peasants Generally, no development of industry and progressive classes, which were capitalist and workers

resulted in no strata, no revolution in the society and led to comprehensive crisis

6 Why did the Nguyễn Court lose the independence of Vietnam in the late 19th century?

First, we take a look at the historical background during this period On August 31st, 1858, French first came to Vietnam in Đà Nẵng The failure in Đà Nẵng battle made French turn to attack Gia Định By 1862, through Nhâm Tuất agreement, French controlled 3 eastern provinces: Biên Hòa, Gia Định, Định Tường,along with 3 western provinces: Vĩnh Long, An Giang, and Hà Tiên by 1867 Southern Vietnam was put under control of French Colonial In 1873, French attacked Hà Nội citadel for the 1st time,Nguyễn Tri Phương died In 1874, by the 2nd agreement, Nguyễn Court officially recognized the domination of French in Vietnam

In 1882, French attacked Hà Nội secondly, Hoàng Diệu

committed suicide In August 1883, Nguyễn Court signed

Harmand agreement with the French before signing Patenotre treaty in 1884 as a complete surrender agreement

The reasons for losing the independence of Vietnam contain two aspects: objective and subjective The objective reasons also meant international conditions In the 19th century, the world-wide capitalism changed for the 2nd time In the 1st phase,

capitalism of free competition changed into imperialism, which was monopolized capitalism, and France was among imperialists

As a result, colonialism became the objective trend of

capitalism’s development Because domestic natural resources bacame smaller and smaller, and domestic labor, manpower, manforce became limited, the need to expand and find out new natural resources, new market, new sources of cheap labor was necessary Imperialists wanted to get more “higher monopoly interest” in colonies, which was the deep reason of colonizing theworld – colonization Therefore, imperialist colonized a lot of countries, especially Asia, Latin America and Africa This was the objective process of colonization Most of the countries were colonized by Western countries; however, some could avoid colonization Thailand and Japan were sample cases It depended

on the talented leadership of the country In Japan, the authority practiced the exact policies through Meiji reform, which was similar to capitalist revolution They wanted to modernize the country, which meant industrialism and capitalism The reform covered many fields, including improving foreign, capitalizing Japanese economy, infrastructure for capitalism Education was prioritized by focusing on modern subjects such as Mathematics and Physics In Vietnam, Nguyễn Trường Tộ’s proposal featured similar suggestions like Japan, but Tự Đức emperor did not accept, and he did not allow to apply into economy As a result,