Talk:History of Vietnam/Archive 2
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| Archive 1 | Archive 2 |
The removal of the "Vietnamese nationalist historiography" section
Why Lê Minh Khải isn't a bad source
I wanted to comment about the removal of a section criticising Vietnamese nationalist historiography with the edit summary "There were no citations for the section I deleted, the person writing this used his own personal blog as a source for everything. It is also filled with many completely conspiratorial views that are impossible to find anywhere else but the Hawaiian's rambling blog. In my opinion this throws the legibility of this entire page in question, because someone has a clear agenda to plaster their opinion as facts all over this. If possible someone please take some time to review." by user "Robstelly". The edit summary is wholly misleading as a number of different sources were mentioned and at Lê Minh Khải's SEAsian History Blog the entries almost always list their sources and is written in an academic manner, so why claim that this blog is bad?
If we look at "A New Vietnamese History. - JUNE 1, 2013" we can see a good analysis of Vietnamese nationalist historiography (this really should be a blue link) and why the section should be restored (either here or somewhere else). There are different perspectives on how Vietnamese history should be presented but I have little doubt that in many cases a lot of lies that were written as modern propaganda pieces persist. In the comment section a commenter named "YKoppen" on JUNE 4, 2013 AT 2:11 PM wrote the following: "I’m so excited for this book. I am new to the field of Vietnamese studies and invested a lot of time into the historical research. The Birth of Vietnam was the first book I read on Vietnamese history and I had some problems with it (I am originally a Chinese studies major). Now that I am able to form my own opinions on the issue I am really looking forward to this new comprehension and also how Taylors views have changed in the past years and if they have been influenced by the Vietnamese self-reassessment processes of the past years." This implies that Vietnamese historiography as a whole has improved and that biases are actively being reviewed within Vietnamese academic circles, unfortunately this isn't true at all and the Vietnamese nationalist historiography way of viewing Vietnamese history persists. Lê Minh Khải replied with his view on the matter on JUNE 4, 2013 AT 4:23 PM. This reply starts with: "Thanks for the comment. By “self-reassessment process” do you mean Doi moi? If so, I don’t think that has really reached historical scholarship (at least not in a significant way). So I think whatever changes are in this book are the result of his own thinking.". This was written by a historical scholar of Vietnamese history and he hasn't seen any academic approaches to Vietnamese historiography occur, so why omit such a thing in an article specifically about the history of Vietnam? I think, assuming good faith, that the person that removed this section from this article simply didn't know who Lê Minh Khải was or that he's a trusted name in the academic scholarship of Vietnamese history. Just because something comes from a blog doesn't mean that it has to be removed.
Further, Lê Minh Khải notes a few interesting things about the book like: "For instance, the first book started with things like the Hung kings and their kingdom of Van Lang. This books starts with “The Empire Comes South” – meaning the arrival of the power/influence of the Qin and Han dynasties in the Red River delta region." Well, this article still mentions a lot about this ancient history, I am not sure it presenting unverifiable legends with documented history is wise as it can give it "more legitimacy" than it should have. I personally don't know where we should draw this line but if both Keith Taylor and Lê Minh Khải draw the line at the Chinese invasion then it says about where the records start and what was unrecorded. Any unrecorded history should be presented as such. "Looking at the index, I don’t think he ever even mentions Van Lang, and the Hung kings appear to be only mentioned in reference to later stories about them." This article actually showcases the facts around the "ancient period" of Vietnamese history this isn't universal yet and many Vietnamese historians still maintain the official narrative, in fact even many "foreign historians" of Vietnamese history (deliberately adding quotation marks to avoid the typical "ownership bias" of "our history" as is common in this field) will accept many Vietnamese claims about all periods of Vietnamese history at face value. For example Keith Taylor used to do this: "In The Birth of Vietnam, Taylor has a comment way in the back in an appendix I think where he says something like “I’m not sure about the Hung kings, but for now I’m going to follow what the Vietnamese have said.” In this book I think he is simply following what he has come to understand though his own scholarship and his own thinking over the years." This isn't a rare development either, as it seems to have happened for a number of historians of Vietnamese history to change their perspectives on Vietnamese history. So why not allow these criticisms to be included in this article? Perhaps this section shouldn't be restored here in this article but I highly doubt that it's not relevant here and the accusation that Lê Minh Khải's SEAsian History Blog was added by himself is laughable when one sees the level of English used by the content that was added, as I sincerely doubt that Professor Lê Minh Khải would write like that.
Regarding sourcing Lê Minh Khải writes: "One thing about this book that will probably lead to some debate/discussion is that it is not footnoted like an academic monograph is. I think it is supposed to be in the style of a “concise history” (even though it’s 700+ pages), and books written like that are in a more “digested” form where the author narrates what he knows, rather than documents everything clearly, and then provides a “bibliographic essay” at the end. So this will probably lead readers to sometimes ask “where is he getting this information from?” That’s fine though, as it can lead to more discussion and debate. (SMILING EMOJI REDACTED).". Well, that brings us back to the original comments, namely that this book would be an acceptable source despite how it does not contain academic notes but a blog that does won't be accepted by most people because it's a blog. --Donald Trung (talk) 14:03, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
Removed section
Now let's actually look at the removed section:
Extended content
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The historian Professor Liam Kelley of the University of Hawaii at Manoa on his Le Minh Khai's SEAsian History Blog wrote on how Vietnamese ultra-nationalists misleadingly reinterpreted outdated theories by western geography professors in order to further a Vietnamese nationalist agenda by claiming that Vietnamese invented rice cultivation and therefore were responsible for civilization while Chinese were pastoralists. The outdated theory has been dis-proven with rice cultivation found to not originate in southeast Asia and the Vietnamese interpretations of the original theories were wrong.[1][2][3] Vietnamese ultra-nationalists also claim the Yijing.[4] Professor Liam Kelley criticized the theory of Edouard Chavannes that southeastern China was the origin of the Vietnamese before they ended up in their current location.[5] Vietnam claims that Phong Châu 峯州 was the capital of the Hùng Kings.[6] Professor Liam Kelley argued that the Tran dynasty constructed Âu Lạc as a way of connecting Vietnam with their homeland of Fujian.[7] The bronze drums of Đông Sơn which date back to far before the advent of native Vietnamese historical records were never seen by Vietnamese before the modern era as a "symbol" of Vietnam.[8][9][10][11][12] After the Trung Sisters production of bronze drums stopped in Vietnam.[13] Đại Việt Sử Ký Toàn Thư copied the mythical accounts of the Huayang guozhi 華陽國志.[14] Liam Kelley disproved the notion that the Phong Châu 峯州 was the capital of the Hùng kings.[6] According to Michael Churchman, contemporary nationalist historians falsely project modern day animosity between Vietnamese and Chinese onto the history of Vietnam under Chinese rule, and falsely portray historical Chinese and Vietnamese forces as either "freedom fighters" or oppressors in a narrative of resistance when no such ethnic boundary existed.[15] Professor Liam Kelley criticized O. W. Wolters for doing this.[16] Pre-1500s Vietnam had Confucianism as an integral component according to Liam Kelly.[17] Confucianism influenced traditional education in Vietnam.[18] According to Professor Liam Kelley during the Tang dynasty native spirits were subsumed into Daoism and the Daoist view of these spirits completely replaced the original native tales.[19] Buddhism and Daoist replaced native narratives surrounding Mount Yên Tử 安子山.[20] People from Song dynasty China like Zhao Zhong and Xu Zongdao fled to Tran dynasty ruled Vietnam after the Mongol invasion of the Song. The Tran dynasty originated from the Fujian region of China as did the Daoist cleric Xu Zongdao who recorded the Mongol invasion and referred to them as "Northern bandits".[21] Wu Bozong 吳伯宗 (b. 1334- d. 1384) was sent as ambassador to Annam and wrote down in the Rongjinji 榮進集 that the Tran dynasty monarch said to him in a reply his Wu's inquiry on Annam's affairs where the Tran ruler said that Annam proudly adhered to Tang dynasty and Han dynasty customs.
The Ming dynasty included the monarchs of the Ly and Tran dynasties in its list of "important people" of Annam.[22] Professor Liam Kelley (Le Minh Khai) suggested that the "north" in Bình Ngô đại cáo referred to the Ming collaborationist Hanoi scholars while the south referred to Thanh Hóa, the base of Lê Lợi since the text referred to "Dai Viet" and did not introduce China before mentioning north.[23] cited John Whitmore and challenged the claim that "Ngô " referred to Ming dynasty China but instead referred to the Chinese settled Red River Delta area of Vietnam.[24] It was English and French foreign languages translations which bowdlerized "south" into "Vietnam" and "north" into China even though people today have no true idea of what south and north referred to in the original text.[25] He believes that it was the Ming collaborationist scholars of Hanoi who were referred to as the "Ngô" and that it was not a term used for Chinese as is currently though in Vietnam, and that the Bình Ngô đại cáo not directed at China.[26] In the 20th century for propaganda purposes against French colonialism, the development of the new genre of "resistance literature" spurred a change in how "Bình Ngô đại cáo" was looked at.[27] Kelley suggested that the "Bình Ngô đại cáo" drew on a previous Ming text.[3][28] North and South in Bình Ngô đại cáo might have referred to internal divisions in Vietnam (Hanoi vs Thanh Hoa) rather than China vs Vietnam.[29] The Hồ dynasty's rule and Vietnamese who worked with the Ming were attacked in the "Bình Ngô đại cáo" by Lê Lợi.[30] The "Bình Ngô đại cáo" criticized a people called "Ngô" in Vietnam, and it did not refer to the Ming Chinese. It saidthat Song dynasty clothing was worn by the Tran and Ming while it slammed and criticized Mongol Yuan customs followed by the Ngô.[31] The Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư contained a constructed genealogy tracing back the political legitimacy of Vietnam's rulers to the Chinese Emperor Shennong similar to how the Northern Wei traced the legitimacy of the Tuoba to the Yellow Emperor.[32] Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư traced the ancestry of the Hùng kings to Consort Âu and Lord Lạc Long who had 100 sons from an egg sac.[33] The purpose of tracing back to Shennong was to claim that the length of Vietnam's history rivaled China's.[14] In the 17th century Vietnamese historians like Ngô Thì Sĩ and Jesuits like Martinio Martini studied texts on the Hồng Bàng Dynasty like Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư and used mathematics to deduce that the information on them were nonsense given the impossible reign years of the monarchs. However, modern Vietnamese now believe that the information is true.[34] Ngô Thì Sĩ used critical analysis of historical texts to question the relations between Zhao Tuo's Nanyue Kingdom in Guangdong and the Vietnamese inhabited Red River Delta, concluding that the Red River Delta was a mere vassal to Nanyue and not an integral part of it in addition to criticizing the existence of the Hồng Bàng Dynasty.[35] Modern Vietnamese nationalists seek to stress local Vietnamese influence in history and downplay the role of foreign origin monarchs like the fact that the family of the Tran dynasty rulers originated in China.[36] Vietnamese historians have sought to construct a fantasy of a continuous succession since the Hung Kings of local political units in Vietnam.[37] Vietnamese scholars and historians have debated over whether to regard Zhao Tuo as part of the "orthodox succession" of rulers or as "enemy invader".[38] Professor Liam Kelley suggested that before Chinese rule the Red River Delta was not under a unified polity.[39] Both Chinese and Vietnamese sovereigns were honored at a temple constructed by the Nguyen dynasty.[40] The Nguyen Empoeror Minh Mang sinicized ethnic minorities such as Cambodians, claimed the legacy of Confucianism and China's Han dynasty for Vietnam, and used the term Han people 漢人 to refer to the Vietnamese.[41] Minh Mang declared that "We must hope that their barbarian habits will be subconsciously dissipated, and that they will daily become more infected by Han [Sino-Vietnamese] customs."[42] This policies were directed at the Khmer and hill tribes.[43] The Nguyen lord Nguyen Phuc Chu had referred to Vietnamese as "Han people" in 1712 when differentiating between Vietnamese and Chams.[44] Minh Mang used the name "Trung Quốc" 中國 to refer to Vietnam.[45] Vietnam also referred to itself as Trung Hạ 中夏. Chinese clothing was forced on Vietnamese people by the Nguyễn.[46][47][48][49] Modern Vietnamese have retroactively labelled figures like Trần Ích Tắc as "traitor" to Annam, even though the word for traitor did not exist in Vietnamese during his time and Vietnamese histories like Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư do not refer to him as a traitor.[50] South Vietnam retained elements of Chinese culture and grammar in their language while North Vietnam actively engaged in a campaign to remove them- while North Vietnam maintained a pro-China position.[51] it was the Cultural Revolution which led to North Vietnam encouraging anti-China sentiment.[52] Many anti-Vietnam war protesters bought into a narrative that Vietnam's history consisted of Chinese invasion for 2,000 years and that Vietnam was a united country.[53] Before modern times scholars in Vietnam wanted to copy China's civilization which they perceived as more civilized but since the French introduced nationalism Vietnam sought to present itself in a different aspect as a civilizational rival.[54] A Vietnamese forged and manufactured a fake ancient mythical script claimed to have been used in ancient Vietnam.[55] Modern Vietnamese historians inserted word changes and altered the meanings of texts written by ancient Vietnamese historians on how battles between rebels in Vietnam and the Chinese states such as the Chen dynasty and Southern Han were viewed.[56] The Nguyễn Dynasty initiated government sponsored ceremonies to the Hùng kings. The French may have established the ceremony on the Hùng kings death and the Hùng Kings had an annual event established for them by Hồ Chí Minh.[57] Due to psychological embarrassment over their rule by foreign imperialists, ancient historical texts were edited for nationalistic purposes by modern Vietnamese historians.[58] In the Mekong Delta area of Cochinchina many Vietnamese and Chinese conducted illegal commercial activities.[59] During the rule of the Chinese Kingdom of Eastern Wu over Vietnam the local people learned Chinese after Chinese people were moved down to live with them.[60] John D. Phan has suggested a new analysis of the linguistic situation in Vietnam under Chinese rule suggesting that a Middle Chinese dialect was spoken by the people of the Red River Delta during the Tang dynasty by drawing on Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary which showed evidence that it was derived from an existing language and that this Middle Chinese dialect was later displaced by a Muong language influenced by Chinese.[61][62][63] Robstelly 6 EDITS
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In it we can see that this section notes that a lot of perceived truths about Vietnamese history are being challenged, but I would add that not all of the content here belongs together as it reads like "a dumping ground" for content from Lê Minh Khải's SEAsian History Blog so I propose keeping the relevant parts, some of the content has already been added to more relevant pages. --Donald Trung (talk) 14:03, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
- I could draft a version of the section that could be restored either here or at a country-specific section about nationalist historiography in Vietnam. --Donald Trung (talk) 14:07, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
Monarchical period (939–1858)
I find it odd that it ends in 1858 rather than in 1883 / 1884, while French Cochinchina was established in 1862 the rest of what we call Vietnam today wouldn't be subjugated until decades later, the native Emperor held power until around the 1890's when the French fully took control over the native administration. I just find it odd that the date 1858 is chosen as the specific end date of the Monarchical period when 1883, 1884, or even 1945 would have been better dates, overlap between different periods can exist. I know that the whole goal of such an overview is to simplify things down and let people click on more detailed bluelinks if they're interested, but I find the specific choice for picking 1858 as end date for the Monarchical period an odd choice. This basically indicates that any French presence already made it the colonial era. Furthermore, why stop the colonial era in 1945? While the Democratic Republic of Vietnam did proclaim their independence in 1945 large parts of the region remained under French control until 1954. I'm not even sure if adding dates to the titles is such a good idea if the lines of where one period begins and another ends are so blurry. --Donald Trung (talk) 22:23, 16 September 2021 (UTC)
Removal of references to Chinese dynasties
@Laska666:, in this edit you removed the following:
- "Vietnam's peculiar geography made it a difficult country to attack, which is why Vietnam under the Hùng kings was for so long an independent and self-contained state. Once Vietnam did succumb to foreign rule, however, it proved unable to escape from it, and for 1,000 years, Vietnam was successively governed by a series of Chinese dynasties: the Western Han, Xin, Eastern Han, Eastern Wu, Western Jin, Eastern Jin, Liu Song, Southern Qi, Liang, Sui, Tang, Wu Zhou, and Southern Han. During these 1,000 years there were many uprisings against Chinese domination, and at certain periods Vietnam was independently governed under the Triệu, Trưng Sisters, Early Lý, Khúc and Dương Đình Nghệ—although their triumphs and reigns were temporary."
Why? I agree that this article shouldn't be Kinh-centric, but why remove this? Maybe it would be handy to add some edit summaries. --Donald Trung (talk) 18:52, 25 September 2021 (UTC)
Dates to conform to contemporary standards
BC should be BCE AD should be CE 114.198.1.246 (talk) 18:31, 9 June 2022 (UTC)
English
The English is appallingly bad. And "approximately 2879 BC"??? Seriously???!!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.12.97.111 (talk) 05:19, 14 July 2023 (UTC)