Judith Henchy (Libraries)

Christoph Giebel (International Studies, History)

beyonddichotomies@gmail.com

The second in a series of three workshops on alternative Vietnamese histories will highlight new scholarship on post-colonial Viet Nam that complicates, challenges and counters prevailing historiographical paradigms that have privileged the actions of central states, imposed nationalist, traditionalist or communist teleologies on Vietnamese history and culture, or enforced simplistic Cold War rhetorical postures. We intend to foreground, for instance, social and intellectual histories that illuminate modes of thinking and being in the post-colonial world, investigate the symbolic order and semantics of post-colonial power, and focus on social and political movements marginalized by dominant Cold War narratives with their presumed dichotomy of a "North Viet Nam" and a "South Viet Nam."

2007 Conference Website: Beyond Teleologies

Conference Program • Abstracts • Information for Visitors

Friday, May 23, 2008
Suzzallo/Allen Library, Smith Room

1:00 pm: Opening Remarks

Christoph Giebel (University of Washington) and Judith Henchy (University of Washington)

1:30 – 5:15 pm:  Panel 1: Civil Society and State Reach

Tuan Hoang (University of Notre Dame)
"Learning to Be Human: The Promotion of Bourgeois Values in Saigon"

Van Nguyen-Marshall (Trent University)
"Associational Life in Saigon, 1950s-1970s"

Tai Van Ta (Harvard University)
"Democracy in Action, with American Influence"

(15 minute break)

David Biggs (University of California, Riverside)
"From Casiers Tonkinoises to Strategic Hamlets and Khu Cong Nghiep: Modernist Responses to the Agricultural Crisis in the Mekong Delta"

Geoffrey C. Stewart (University of Western Ontario) "Making the 'Personal' Political: Modernization and Civic Action in the Republic of Viet Nam, 1955-1963"

Ken MacLean (Clark University)
"Uncertain Fixations: Reassessing the Experimental Wave of the Land Reforms (1953-1954)"

Dang Dinh Trung (Australian National University)
"Post-1975 Collectivization in Southern Viet Nam: How Local Conditions and Local Politics Affected the Performance of Viet Nam’s National Policies"

5:45-6:45 pm: Reception
Simpson Center, Communications 206

7:00 pm: Keynote Address
Communications 120
Ngo Vinh Long (University of Maine)
"From Polarization to Integration in Viet Nam"

Saturday, May 24, 2008
Suzzallo/Allen Library, Smith Room

9:10 am – 12:10 pm:  Panel 2: Region, Time, and Movement

Tran Ngoc Them (Viet Nam National University – Ho Chi Minh City) and Le Xuan Hy (Seattle University)
"Beyond Dichotomies: Cultural Diversities and Confluences"

Christoph Giebel (University of Washington)
"Comments on Post-Geneva Spatial Representations of War"

Claudine Ang (Cornell University)
"The Accommodative Nature of Southern Narratives of Vietnamese History, 1954-1975"

(5 minute break)

Kate Jellema (Marlboro College)
"Doing Our Part (Gop Phan): History, Agency and Merit in a Northern Vietnamese Village"

Nguyen Quang Hung (Viet Nam National University – Ha Noi) and Le Xuan Hy (Seattle University)
"The North Vietnamese Catholic Village of Phung Khoang During 1945-1986"

Diane Fox (Holy Cross College)
"Agent Orange: Blurring the Boundaries"

(Lunch break, 55 minutes)

1:10 – 4:45 pm: Panel 3: Opposition and Dissidence

Hoang Ngo (University of Washington)
"A Rising Tide: The Buddhist Movement in 1964"

Sophie Quinn-Judge (Temple University)
"A Study of Local Women and Globalized War: The Revolutionary Women of Quang Nam and Quang Ngai Provinces"

Jason Gibbs (San Francisco Public Libraries)
"Capitalist Music Brings Jail: Love Songs in Ha Noi During Viet Nam’s American War"

(5 minute break)

Wynn Wilcox (Western Connecticut State University) "Existentialism in Saigon Intellectual Culture"

Duy Lap Nguyen (University of California, Irvine)
"Over-consuming Imperialism: South Vietnamese Urban Resistance to American Occupation during the War in Viet Nam"

Chuong-Dai Vo (University of California, San Diego) "The Politics of Literary Criticism and the Making of Modern Viet Nam: The Transition from a Command Economy to Globalization"

Khai-Thu Nguyen (University of California, Berkeley) "Luu Quang Vu and the Performance of Reform in Doi Moi Vietnam"

All abstracts (pdf)

Panel 1: Civil Society and State Reach (pdf)

Panel 2: Region, Time, and Movement (pdf)

Panel 3: Opposition and Dissidence (pdf)

A block of rooms for visitors has been reserved at the Watertown Hotel under the name, "History of Viet Nam Conference." Call (866) 944-4242 to make a reservation.

UW campus map
Transportation information (pdf)
Local restaurants (pdf)
Local hotels (pdf)
Seattle visitors' guide (pdf)