Luận án về ký ức và danh tính trong tác phẩm của các nhà văn Việt Nam sống ở Đức - Một nghiên cứu về văn học Việt Nam

MEMORY AND IDENTITY IN THE WORKS OF VIETNAMESE AUTHORS LIVING IN GERMANY Dissertation zur Erlangung des Grades der Doktorin der Philosophie (Dr. phil) an der Fakultät für Geisteswissenschaften der Universität Hamburg vorgelegt von Trần Tịnh Vy aus Vietnam Hamburg 2020 Gutachter der Dissertation Professor Dr. Jörg Thomas Engelbert Professor Dr. Jan Van der Putten Datum der Disputation July 30, 2020 II TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements.

Migration in Vietnam. Purpose of the research. Memory and identity .3 Memory, identity and more than that: Nostalgia, urban ecology and different interpretations of diaspora. Research questions and scope of the research.

Research questions and expected outcomes. Scope of the research. Structure of the dissertation. 30 CHAPTER 1: VIETNAMESE AND VIETNAMESE LITERATURE IN GERMANY 32 1.

Vietnamese in Germany. The boat people. The contract workers .3 Family reunification, and Vietnamese students. The divergence of Vietnamese literature in Germany.

Characteristics of Vietnamese literature in Germany: An approach on literary space .1 Towards the host land .2 Towards the homeland. 64 CHAPTER 2: FROM GERMAN DREAMS TO GERMAN LIVES: ENVISIONING IDENTITY OF VIETNAMESE FORMER CONTRACT WORKERS IN VIETNAMESE LITERATURE IN GERMANY. Introduction to the literature written by the former contract workers. The narratives of departure in Hộ chiếu buồn and Một nửa lá số by Thế Dũng .1 On the departure .2 In search of identity.

Dream versus reality: Living and working in the new country. The narrative of return in Quyên by Nguyễn Văn Thọ. 97 III CHAPTER 3: NARRATIVES ABOUT MEMORY AND THE INQUIRY OF CULTURAL IDENTITY IN LÊ MINH HÀ’S NOVELS. Memory and literature: Theoretical framework.

The fiction of memory: The case of Gió tự thời khuất mặt by Lê Minh Hà .1 Memory as a structural aspect of the fiction .2 Memory as the main theme of the fiction or the power of memory. Nature, city and identity: The analysis of Phố vẫn gió from a perspective of urban ecology .1 Theoretical framework of urban ecology .2 Architectural space is a symbol of social status .3 Different living spaces reflect different behaviors .4 Place and identity: The expansion of the urban and the emergence of identity in the city. 134 CHAPTER 4: NOSTALGIA, MEMORY, AND IDENTITY IN NGÔ NGUYÊN DŨNG’S WORKS. Introduction to Ngô Nguyên Dũng’s works.

Nostalgia in Ngô Nguyên Dũng’s works. The dark memories of the boat people crossing the sea. Nostalgia and its consequences. Hybridity and the search for identity .1 Hybridity through interracial love affairs .2 In search of identity.

Customary literature as the representation of nostalgia. The customs and beliefs of the Southerners in Mekong Delta through Ngô Nguyên Dũng’s short stories.2 Condemnation of the inequality of the landlord-tenant relationship .3 Describing historical changes during the resistance war against the French. 212 CHAPTER 5: JOURNEYS AS THE DRIVER TO SEARCH FOR MEMORY AND IDENTITY IN ĐOÀN MINH PHƯỢNG’S NOVELS. Introduction to Đoàn Minh Phượng.

The loss of memory or fractured memory as the remains. To be or not to be? The conflict between death and existence. In search of identity: .1 When their stories ….2 … are also yours. 288 List of tables.

312 List of abbreviations. 313 List of publications. 317 Eidesstattliche Erklärung. 319 V Acknowledgements This dissertation could not have been started without the encouragement and the acceptance of my first supervisor.

I would like to take this opportunity to express a deep sense of gratitude to Professor Dr. Jörg Thomas Engelbert. He not only gave me his trust from my very first proposal but also his invaluable instructions and corrections later on. His entire devotion to Vietnamese studies also awakens my responsibility for taking on matters of concern in my country.

My thanks also go to my second supervisor Professor Dr. Jan Van der Putten. Thank you very much for believing in what I have written. Your prompt comments throughout and your meticulous editing of the manuscript are very appreciated.

I also wish to thank all of the lecturers and friends in the Department of Languages and Cultures of Southeast Asia, who have created such a wonderful environment for learning both soft and hard skills. I would like to thank Herr Cao Quang Nghiệp for helping me and advising me during my Ph. My specific thanks go to Frau Angelika Finch for her help and kindness in solving troubles in my student life. I owe a special thanks to my family in Vietnam for their unstinting support and encouragement during the time I have studied abroad.

Wherever I go and whatever I do, my parents are always in my heart, helping me to become stronger and more mature. Finally, I want to give my thorough thanks to my husband Đăng Thành. His sweetness and support make me believe that love completely comes from those who used to be strangers regardless of our blood relations. Thank you very much for always being by my side.

Migration in Vietnam Vietnam, a country with high levels of geographical mobility, has experienced numerous periods of both domestic and international migration. The history of Vietnam means that it has witnessed the expansion of regions and the migration of people in various directions, mainly from the North to the South1 and from the south-west to the Lower Mekong.2 From the early seventeenth century, the Vietnamese migrated to Cambodia. They are political or religious victims, landless people, fishermen, cross-border smugglers, and criminals. Since the late seventeenth century, there have been Vietnamese Catholic villages in Cambodia.3 In addition, the whole coastal region between the Mekong Delta estuaries and the Malay Peninsula witnessed the “frequent movements of people and exchanges of commodities and cultural practices among Viets, Siamese, Mon- Khmer, and Malays with Chinese settlers, sojourners and junk traders”4 in the later eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Under the theme of internal migration, a vast number of studies have explored key patterns of domestic migration, especially in the post-war and reform periods, both in the form of forced migration and spontaneous migration. For example, the migratory paths from rural to urban or from rural to rural are discussed by Dang Nguyen Anh5, Minh Nguyen6 and Luong Van Hy7. Andrew Hardy also discusses migration in the other 1 Li Tana 2004, “The Water Frontier: An Introduction”, 11; K.Taylor 1993, “Nguyen Hoang and the Beginning of Viet Nam’s Southward Expansion”, 42-65; Li Tana (trans.) 2007, Trấn Tây phong thổ ký [The customs of the Western Commandery]. 1838), 148–156; Nguyễn Đăng Thục 1970, “Nam tiến Việt Nam”, 25-43; Phù Lang Trương Bá Phát 1970, “Lịch sử cuộc Nam tiến của dân tộc Việt Nam”, 45-137.

2 Nguyễn Văn Hầu 1970, “Sự thôn thuộc và khai thác đất Tầm Phong Long-Chặng cuối cùng của cuộc Nam Tiến,” 3-24. 3 Also, the establishment of military colonies in Trấn Tây3 (The Western protectorate) resulted in the Vietnamese migration to Cambodia. For further reference of Minh Mạng’s orders to expand the state to the southwestern frontier by setting up population and plantation, see further in Viện Khoa học Xã hội Việt Nam-Viện Sử học 2004, Quốc sử quán triều Nguyễn Đại Nam thực lục Tập 4. 4 Li Tana 2004, “The Water Frontier: An Introduction”, 2.

5 Dang Nguyen Anh 2017, “Rural-to-urban migration in Vietnam: Trend and institutions”, 158- 170. 6 Minh Nguyen, “Fictitious Kinship: Intimacy, Relatedness and Boundaries in the Life of Hanoi’s Migrant Domestic Workers”, 81- 96. 7 Hy Van Luong 2012, “Multiple Narratives on Migration in Vietnam and Their Methodological Implications”, 107-124. from the Red River Delta to highland areas in the twentieth century.8 Internal migration in Vietnam in modern times is also the prominent theme in several other studies, for example in research conducted by Dang Nguyen Anh9, Karl Miller10 and Christopher Goscha11.

Research has been long interested in explaining the motives of migration in which both “pull” factors, destination-specific incentives, and “push” factors, those at the places of origin, were counted. Generally, migration is a key response of individuals to political conflicts and difficulties in their lives, as well as the promise of better economic and educational opportunities.12 The migration process not only leads to the expansion of national territory and the diversity of ethnic communities within Vietnam but also the formation of Vietnamese community groups in other countries. The first migration cases of Vietnamese people started with small groups studying overseas in France and later in Hong Kong. According to the scholar Phan Khoang, a group of Vietnamese teenagers who were sent to Portugal by the Nguyễn Lord Nguyễn Phúc Khoát to study Portuguese in 1744, were the first Vietnamese people to go overseas to learn a language.13 There was a small number of children, mostly from influential families, who were sent to Catholic schools in France in 1865.

The number consisted of ninety men studying in France by 1870.14 In 1878, King Tự Đức issued terms and decrees on studying foreign languages and apprenticeships abroad to create conditions for people who went abroad to serve the court upon their 8 His research not only discusses the migration and resettlement campaigns by the state from 1945 to 1954 but also the experiences of the migrants. See further in Andrew Hardy and Red Hills 2003, Migrants and the State in the Highlands of Vietnam. 9 Dang Nguyen Anh 1999, “Market Reforms and Internal labor migration in Vietnam”, 381- 409. 10 Karl Miller, “From Humanitarian to Economic; The Changing Face of Vietnamese Migration”, https://www.org/article/humanitarian-economic-changing-face- vietnamese-migration.

11 See further in Christoper Goscha 2016, Vietnam A New History. 12 Ian Coxhead, Nguyen Viet Cuong, Linh Hoang Vu 2015, “Migration in Vietnam: New Evidence from Recent Surveys”, http://documents.org/curated/en/969411468197949288/pdf/102310-NWP- Migration-in-Vietnam-Nov-18-clean-Box-394830B-PUBLIC.pdf); Anh LT, Hoang Vu L, Bonfoh B, Schelling E 2012. “An analysis of interprovincial migration in Vietnam from 1989 to 2009”, 1–12. 13 Phan Khoang 1961, Việt Nam Pháp thuộc sử 1884-1945, 125.

14 Scott McConnell 1989, Leftward Journey The Education of Vietnamese Students in France 1919-1939, 5.15 However, the number of Vietnamese people traveling abroad during this period was not large. The first wave of Vietnamese migration dates back to the nineteenth century during Minh Mạng’s reign, when the northern and southern parts of Houaphan, Northeast Laos, became the Vietnamese territories (Trấn Ninh).16 Since the first massive migrations of the Vietnamese to Laos at the end of the nineteenth century, there were “several hundred families and sometimes even whole village communities moved across the Lao- Annamite frontier, crossing the old frontier region.”17 Also, the French began recruiting Vietnamese labour to work for the French government in Laos in the 1890s.18 The Vietnamese emigrants in the nineteenth century to Asian countries are explained by Priscilla Koh as the result of “the shifting dynastic fortunes, local wars or religious oppression by Vietnamese kings.”19 The second wave of migration took place during the French colonial period (1859- 1954) in Vietnam. The late nineteenth century witnessed a large number of Vietnamese people migrating to Laos and Cambodia, which was the result of “the administrative and economic development of French Indochina.”20 Besides, a large group of Vietnamese laborers was hired to build the Indochina-Yunnan railway in the Southwest China at the beginning of the twentieth century.21 There were also a number of the indentured workers, mostly the Northern Vietnamese, who were mainly hired to work in the nickel mines in New Caledonia in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century.22 During World War I, the Vietnamese were recruited to work in “factories, military industrial complexes, 15 Phan Khoang 1961, Việt Nam Pháp thuộc sử 1884-1945, 125. 16 Oliver Tappe 2015, “A Frontier in the Frontier: Socio-political Dynamics and Colonial Administration in the Lao-Vietnamese Borderlands”, 371.

17 Oliver Tappe 2015, “A Frontier in the Frontier: Socio-political Dynamics and Colonial Administration in the Lao-Vietnamese Borderlands”, 378. Baird et al 2019, “Land Grabs and Labour: Vietnamese Workers on Rubber Plantations in Southern Laos”, 50-70.