North Vietnamese Scholarship
The “Blank Space” in Vietnamese Historical Scholarship
In the 1950s, historical scholarship in the DRV was part of an international world of scholarship. First and foremost, Vietnamese historians in the DRV were
Krushchev and the Denunciation of Trần Hưng Đạo’s Personality Cult
In June of 1956, Minh Tranh published an article in Văn Sử Địa with the long and awkward title of “Oppose the worship of individuals,
Stalin and Vietnamese Scholars
“It is generally recognized that no science can develop and flourish without a battle of opinions, without freedom of criticism.” This is a statement which
The Chinese as “Fighting Friends” of the Vietnamese
Is Vietnamese history all about “resistance to Chinese aggression”? No, said DRV scholar Minh Tranh in 1954. Instead, he argued the Vietnamese and Chinese have
Đào Duy Anh’s Ambiguous Statements about the Hùng Kings
The topic of Đào Duy Anh’s comments about the term “Hùng” came up in a discussion to a previous post, so I thought I would
Trần Quốc Vượng’s Khun Argument: Why Vietnamese Scholarship Doesn’t Progress
In an article entitled “On the Title ‘Hùng King’” (Về Danh Hiệu ‘Hùng Vương’”) in the third Hùng Vương Dụng Nước volume (this volume was
Phan Huy Lê and 4,000 Years of Vietnamese History
Phan Huy Lê, Trần Quốc Vương, Hà Văn Tấn and Lương Ninh published an official textbook in the 1980s for use in universities in Vietnam
Trần Huy Liệu and the Problem of 20th Century Vocabulary
In 1969 Trần Huy Liệu wrote an article in Nghiên cứu lịch sử in which he defended the importance of patriotism and differentiated it from
Deconstructing Vietnamese Scholarship: Nguyễn Linh & Hoàng Hưng
In an article from 1968 entitled “The problem of the Hùng kings and archaeology,” Nguyễn Linh and Hoàng Hưng examined information from historical texts and
Deconstructing Vietnamese Scholarship: Văn Tân
In 1967, Văn Tân published an article in Nghiên cứu lịch sử entitled “The problem of the period of the Hùng kings in the history
Conflating Historical Texts with Historical Reality in the DRV
In 1967, the journal Nghiên cứu lịch sử published an article entitled “We Should Study the Issue of the Hồng Bàng Period.” This article begins
Historians, Loyalty to the Party, and Pure Science
What does it mean to be loyal to the Party? This is a question which Trần Huy Liệu asked in an article in Nghiên cứu
The Death of Historical Inquiry in Vietnam: Trần Huy Liệu
Vietnamese historical scholarship died in the late 1960s/early 1970s. It was killed by scholars and members of the ruling elite in the DRV. These men
Deconstructing Vietnamese Scholarship – Phạm Đức Dương
In 1982, linguist Phạm Đức Dương wrote a very important article on the role of Tai speakers in early Vietnamese history called “The Origin of
Phan Ngọc, Stalin and the Bình Ngô Đại Cáo
I came across a syllabus for a course on Vietnamese culture at one of the major universities in Vietnam. I was looking through the materials
On (Not) Discussing the Nation in Vietnam
I was reading an article which Trần Huy Liệu published in the journal, Văn sử địa, in 1956 – “Bàn thêm về vấn đề hình
Deconstructing Vietnamese Scholarship – Đinh Gia Khánh
Đinh Gia Khánh (1924-2003) was a scholar who was instrumental in establishing the field of folk culture (văn hoá dân gian) in Vietnam. He wrote
