Vietnam: Notable Concepts and Groups

Vietnamese (All Facts)

• They traded with and learned from China

• They adapted Chinese writing systems and architectural styles

• They launched violent rebellions against Chinese influence multiple times throughout their history

  • This was due to their culture, which differed from their Chinese overlords’ culture in several ways

• Their villages operated independently of a national government and thus political centralization did not exist among them

• Despite their efforts to maintain the purity of their own culture, Sinification did occur amongst them

• Upon the fall of China’s Tang Dynasty, they pushed out the Chinese and showed a strong capacity for the first time for guerilla warfare, given their deep knowledge of their own land

• In 1540, they began to trade with Portugal

Vietnamese Women (All Facts)

• Group which enjoyed greater independence in their married lives than did Chinese women in the Confucian tradition

• Group which resented their inferior status when under the Chinese, rejecting the customs of

  • Foot binding

  • Polygyny

Nuclear Family (All Facts)

• Type of family structure preferred by the Vietnamese throughout their history

Scholar Gentry / Officials (All Facts)

• Class of educated Vietnamese men who were loyal to the village peasants (instead of being loyal to the emperor like in China)

• Class of educated Vietnamese men who often led revolts against the Vietnamese government if they deemed it too oppressive