Archives par mot-clé : anthropologie sociale

Welfare for Migrant Factory Workers in China and Vietnam Faculty of Sociology, Bielefeld University – ERC

Annonce de recrutement de deux jeunes docteur.es
dans le cadre d’un projet de recherche financé par l’ERC.

2 Phd-plus positions available in ERC-funded research project

Welfare for Migrant Factory Workers in China and Vietnam

Faculty of Sociology, Bielefeld University

We are recruiting 2 Phd-plus positions for the European Research Council (ERC) funded project Welfare for Migrant Factory Workers in China and Vietnam led by Minh Nguyen, Professor of Social Anthropology. This is a 5-year research project (2019-2024) that comparatively examines the moral dynamics of welfare transformations in China and Vietnam through the case of migrant workers employed by global factories. The project will take into account how these dynamics play out both in policy processes and in the lives of the workers and their families, through comparative social policy analysis (1 post-doc researcher) and ethnography (2 PhD researchers).

The two PhD researchers will each conduct an ethnographic study of migrant factory workers’ welfare, one in China and one in Vietnam. Upon successful completion of the PhD, there is possibility to be employed as post-doc researchers until the end of the project (hence PhD-plus).

Applicants should have research proposals that suit the objectives and approaches of the project. These are available at the project’s website, which is still under construction but carries essential information: http://www.uni-bielefeld.de/soz/welfarestruggles/index.html.

Application deadline: May 2nd.

The appointment will start as soon as possible.  For more information on requirements, salary and benefits, and how to apply, please see the job advertisement

Here is a link to all the project’s job advertisements on H-Net: https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=58466

Please direct inquiries to minh.nguyen@uni-bielefeld.de; applications should be sent to sekretariat.nguyen@uni-bielefeld.de

Kirsten W. Endres, Ann Marie Leshkowich (eds.) : Traders in Motion. Identities and Contestations in the Vietnamese Marketplace

[ndlr] Parution. Présentation de l’éditeur.

Traders in Motion

Identities and Contestations in the Vietnamese Marketplace
Edited by Kirsten W. Endres, Ann Marie Leshkowich

With essays covering diverse topics, from seafood trade across the Vietnam-China border, to street traders in Hanoi, to gold shops in Ho Chi Minh City, Traders in Motion spans the fields of economic and political anthropology, geography, and sociology to illuminate how Vietnam’s rapidly expanding market economy is formed and transformed by everyday interactions among traders, suppliers, customers, family members, neighbors, and officials.

The contributions shed light on the micropolitics of local-level economic agency in the paradoxical context of Vietnam’s socialist orientation and its contemporary neoliberal economic and social transformation. The essays examine how Vietnamese traders and officials engage in on-the-ground contestations to define space, promote or limit mobility, and establish borders, both physical and conceptual. The contributors show how trading experiences shape individuals’ notions of self and personhood, not just as economic actors, but also in terms of gender, region, and ethnicity. Traders in Motion affords rich comparative insight into how markets form and transform and what those changes mean.

Ref. : Endres, Kirsten W., and Ann Marie Leshkowich, eds. Traders in Motion: Identities and Contestations in the Vietnamese Marketplace. Southeast Asia Program Publications, Cornell University Press, 2018.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction: Space, Mobility, Borders, and Trading Frictions
ANN MARIE LESHKOWICH AND KIRSTEN W. ENDRES

PART I. Space, Place, and Contentious Politics of Market Redevelopment
Introduction: The Spatial Politics of Marketplaces
LINDA J. SELIGMANN

Chapter 1
Making the Marketplace: Traders, Cadres, and Bureaucratic Documents in Lào Cai City
KIRSTEN W. ENDRES

Chapter 2
“Run and Hide When You See the Police”: Livelihood Diversification and the Politics of the Street Economy in Vietnam’s Northern Uplands
SARAH TURNER

Chapter 3
Grand Designs? State Agendas and the Lived Realities of Market Redevelopment in Upland Northern Vietnam
CHRISTINE BONNIN

Chapter 4
Ghost Markets and Moving Bazaars in Hanoi’s Urban Space
GERTRUD HÜWELMEIER

PART II. Circuits of Mobility, Identities, and Power Relations
Introduction: Moving and Shaking
ERIK HARMS

Chapter 5
A Mobile Trading Network from Central Coastal Vietnam: Growth, Social Network, and Gender
HY VAN LUONG

Chapter 6
Money, Risk Taking, and Playing: Shifting Masculinity in a Waste-Trading Community in the Red River Delta
MINH T. N. NGUYEN

Chapter 7
“Strive to Make a Living” in the Era of Urbanization and Modernization: The Story of Petty Traders in a Hanoi Peri-urban Community
NGUYỄN THỊ THANH BÌNH

Chapter 8
Dealing with Uncertainty: Itinerant Street Vendors and Local Officials in Hanoi
LISA BARTHELMES

PART III. Borderwork
Introduction: Constructing, Maintaining, and Navigating Boundaries
CHRIS GREGORY

Chapter 9
Regulations and Raids, or the Precarious Place of Gold Shops in Vietnam
ALLISON TRUITT

Chapter 10
Moralities of Commerce in a Northern Vietnamese Trading Community
ESTHER HORAT

Chapter 11
Fuel Trade: People, Places, and Transformations along the Coal Briquetting Chain
ANNUSKA DERKS

Chapter 12
Arbitrage over the Beilun/Kalong River: Chinese Adjustments to Border Trade Practices in Vietnam
CAROLINE GRILLOT

Afterword
GRACIA CLARK

Contributors:
Lisa Barthelmes, Christine Bonnin, Gracia Clark, Annuska Derks, Kirsten W. Endres, Chris Gregory, Caroline Grillot, Erik Harms, Esther Horat, Gertrud Hüwelmeier, Ann Marie Leshkowich, Hy Van Luong, Minh T. N. Nguyen, Nguyen Thi Thanh Binh, Linda J. Seligmann, Allison Truitt, Sarah Turner.

Source : Cornell University Press

Esther Horat : Market Transformation and Trade Dynamics in a Peri-urban Village. Reflections from a Vietnamese Marketplace [PhD.]

[ndlr] Annonce de la thèse d’Esther Horat soutenue en mars 2016 à l’Université de Zurich. Nous reproduisons ci-dessous le message de l’anthropologue Kirsten Endres posté sur VSG avec son aimable autorisation.

In March this year, Esther Horat successfully defended her doctoral dissertation entitled “Market Transformation and Trade Dynamics in a Peri-urban Village. Reflections from a Vietnamese Marketplace.” Esther was a PhD candidate at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology from 2011-2015. She defended her thesis at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, and was awarded a “magna cum laude” (with great praise) by the committee consisting of Peter Finke, Annuska Derks (both University of Zurich), and myself.

Abstract:

Based on twelve months of ethnographic research in the Vietnamese village of Ninh Hiệp, this dissertation offers an account of the various factors that have enabled it to transform into a regional trading hub for clothing and to maintain this position until the present day. The work pays great attention to how traders experience, negotiate, and react to state policies concerning the redevelopment of markets, and, in doing so, how they actively shape the political economy of Vietnam. New modes of governance – consisting of the ambivalent use of socialist and neoliberal ideologies and practices – are a crucial aspect of the study.

This research was conducted against the backdrop of decades of economic reforms initiated in socialist Vietnam in the late 1980s. Ninh Hiệp, a village along the Red River Delta, serves as a site for understanding some of the major structural changes in the region’s formal and informal labor markets and their impact on the lives of traders. In exploring some of the strategies traders employ to cope with the uncertainties of the post-reform period, the dissertation places particular emphasis on the productive side of uncertainties. Not only do traders adapt resourcefully to global capitalist formations and thereby shape the local economy, but they also deepen their social relations when confronted with uncertainties. The dissertation demonstrates how social networks among traders, as well as trust-based relations that shape informal banking and credit systems, are crucial for the functioning of the market. In addition to allowing for transactions without – or at least scarce – capital, social networks ensure the circulation of valuable information and provide access to producers and markets.

Looking closely at the operation and complexities of family businesses, the thesis discusses the dynamics involved in shaping relations and expectations across the gender and generational divide. Rather than analyzing family businesses in terms of efficiency, exploitation, or as an economic strategy of last resort, this dissertation argues in favor of their conception as agents of social change. Finally, this dissertation argues that the notion of morality is central to the lives of traders on three levels: (a) as a strategy for negotiating the boundaries of a moral community, (b) as a government tactic to project a legitimate image of itself and its policies, and (c) serving as an existential function in the face of ambiguities triggered by the socialist and neoliberal economic orders.

Many congratulations to Esther Horat!

Kirsten Endres

Lucie Labbé : « Danseuses et divinités. Modalités et enjeux de l’apprentissage de la danse de cour cambodgienne » [thèse]

[ndlr] Annonce d’une soutenance de thèse en anthropologie sociale sur le Cambodge.

« Danseuses et divinités. Modalités et enjeux de l’apprentissage de la danse de cour cambodgienne »

Lucie Labbé

Soutenance de thèse de doctorat de l’EHESS (École des hautes études en sciences sociales) en ethnologie – anthropologie sociale sous la direction de Mme Bénédicte Brac de la Perrière

mercredi 6 avril 2016 à Paris

 

Résumé de la thèse :

Cette thèse a pour objet la danse de cour cambodgienne qu’elle aborde non seulement en tant que production sociale mais aussi dans ses aspects esthétiques et techniques. D’origine rituelle et palatine, cette forme de danse également nommée « danse classique khmère » est aujourd’hui enseignée dans un contexte étatique institutionnel. Depuis quelques décennies, la danse de cour est aussi enseignée et pratiquée dans les cadres touristique et humanitaire au sein de groupes de danse constitués, le plus souvent, de jeunes gens issus de milieux défavorisés. Des tournées internationales de troupes professionnelles et des associations créées par des Cambodgiens de la diaspora ont également contribué à l’exporter hors du Cambodge.

Partant de ces observations, les conditions dans lesquelles le « savoir dansé » est aujourd’hui incarné hors de la cour sont examinées afin de mettre en évidence le rôle actuel de la danse et des danseuses. Il s’est avéré que, dans les différents contextes où elle existe, la danse de cour n’apparaissait pas seulement comme un symbole visible de l’identité cambodgienne. En effet, une efficacité rituelle lui est toujours reconnue dans certains cadres, en particulier celui du ministère de la Culture et des Beaux-Arts. Là, l’apprentissage est particulièrement rigoureux et rythmé par des cérémonies qui actualisent le lien entre les générations passées et présentes de maîtresses et d’élèves.

Les danseuses, forgées par la danse à la fois dans leur corps et dans leur esprit, incarnent des modèles de femmes khmères dans un cadre ethnico-national où la royauté demeure un référent social. Certaines  revendiquent par ailleurs un nouveau statut d’artiste en développant une expression personnelle dans la continuité mais aussi, pour quelques-unes, dans une forme de rupture avec les référents monarchiques et étatiques.

Le jury sera composé de :

  • M. Michel ANTELME, professeur, INALCO
  • Mme Bénédicte BRAC DE LA PERRIÈRE, directrice de recherche, CNRS
  • M. Jean-Paul COLLEYN, directeur d’études, CNRS / EHESS
  • M. Michael HOUSEMAN, directeur d’études, CNRS / EPHE
  • Mme Dana RAPPOPORT, chargée de recherche, CNRS / EHESS
  • Mme Ashley THOMPSON, maître de conférence, SOAS (Royaume Uni)

 

Informations pratiques :

La soutenance aura lieu le mercredi 6 avril 2016 à 14h au

Centre Asie du Sud-Est (CASE)

Bâtiment Le France, salle 638 (6ème étage)

190 avenue de France, 75013 Paris

Accès : Métro ligne 6 (station : Quai de la gare) ou bus 89 (arrêt : Bibliothèque François Mitterrand).

Image “à la une” : danse classique khmère dans Reamker, danse avec les dieux, documentaire de Stéphane Lebon, 1993, 58’.

Sarah Turner, Christine Bonnin, and Jean Michaud : Frontier Livelihoods – Hmong in the Sino-Vietnamese Borderlands [parution]

[ndlr] Parution d’un nouvel ouvrage sur les Hmongs, une étude fondée sur les archives et du terrain contemporain. Présentation de l’éditeur.

FrontierLivelihoods

Do ethnic minorities have the power to alter the course of their fortune when living within a socialist state? In Frontier Livelihoods, the authors focus their study on the Hmong – known in China as the Miao – in the Sino-Vietnamese borderlands, contending that individuals and households create livelihoods about which governments often know little.

The product of wide-ranging research over many years, Frontier Livelihoods bridges the traditional divide between studies of China and peninsular Southeast Asia by examining the agency, dynamics, and resilience of livelihoods adopted by Hmong communities in Vietnam and in China’s Yunnan Province. It covers the reactions to state modernization projects among this ethnic group in two separate national jurisdictions and contributes to a growing body of literature on cross-border relationships between ethnic minorities in the borderlands of China and its neighbors and in Southeast Asia more broadly.

Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments vii

1 Upland Alternatives: An Introduction 3

2 Frontier Dynamics: Borders and the Hmong 20

3 Borderland Livelihoods: Everyday Decisions and Agrarian Change 38

4 Livestock Transactions: Buffalo Traversing the Borderlands 63

5 Locally Distilled Alcohol: Commodifying an Upland Tradition 84

6 Farming under the Trees: Old Skills and New Markets 104

7 Weaving Livelihoods: Local and Global Hmong Textile Trades 125

8 The Challenge: Making a Living on the Margins 148

Notes 173

Glossary 187

References 189

Index 217

Sarah Turner is professor of geography at McGill University. She is the author of Indonesia’s Small Entrepreneurs: Trading on the Margins and editor of Red Stamps and Gold Stars: Fieldwork Dilemmas in Upland Socialist Asia.

Christine Bonnin is lecturer in geography at University College Dublin.

Jean Michaud is professor of social anthropology at Université Laval. He is the author of The A to Z of the People of the Southeast Asian Massif and coeditor of Moving Mountains: Ethnicity and Livelihoods in Highland China, Vietnam, and Laos.

Réf. : Turner Sarah, Bonnin Christine, Michaud Jean, Frontier Livelihoods: Hmong in the Sino-Vietnamese Borderlands, Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2015.

Source : University of Washington Press

Catherine Earl : Vietnam’s New Middle Classes – Gender, Career, City

Earl_VietnamsNewMiddleClasses[ndlr] Nouvelle publication sur les classes moyennes vietnamiennes.

This volume explores the social consequences of macro-economic reform introduced in Vietnam more than a quarter of a century ago through a focus on young women graduates who hope to find success in Ho Chi Minh City’s growing graduate labour market. They are part of Vietnam’s new middle class, an educated and affluent segment of society growing with the rapid urbanization of Vietnam’s major cities.

Drawing on a rich person-centred ethnography supplemented with middle-class Vietnamese women’s published autobiographies, it reveals how opportunities for professional work, further education, and leisure lifestyling attract young migrants, particularly female graduates, to Vietnam’s mega-urban Southeast region. Centred on Ho Chi Minh City, it argues that Vietnam’s Southeast enables young women, so long as they remain single, to realize aspirations for betterment that affect not only their own lives, but those of their families and communities who remain in rural Vietnam. It highlights the socio-cultural and material benefits realized through remittances received from urban daughters to emphasize the salience of kinship during periods of social transformation.

The volume concludes with a wide-ranging look at the emergence of middle classes in Pacific Asia in order to locate the Vietnamese new middle class within a globalizing context.

Contents

Acknowledgements vii

1. Middle classes in post-reform Ho Chi Minh City 1
2. Urban middle classes in postcolonial Saigon 49
3. Living in twenty-first century Ho Chi Minh City 87
4. Lifestyles of professional work 109
5. New middle-class leisure culture 135
6. Social mobility in a multi-dimensional family 172
7. Delaying and desiring marriage 209
8. Conclusion 240
References 271
Index 302

Catherine Earl is a social anthropologist and research assistant at Federation Business School, Federation University, Australia. She is a frequent visitor to Vietnam and she has published on social mobility, social welfare and social change in Vietnam and in Australia.

Source : NIAS Press