Cultivating Guests: Tai Household Transformations in Vietnam
Malita Allan, Sociology and Anthropology, La Trobe University
I spent eight months in 2004-2005 conducting ethnographic fieldwork in two neighbouring ethnic Tai tourism villages in northern Vietnam. Believed to have migrated from the southern China/northern Vietnam border in the 14th century, the Tai have since been settled in their present-day location, cultivating wet rice in a breathtaking valley among the mountains. The elderly villagers’ lives have changed dramatically in their lifetime, from French colonial rule to Vietnamese socialist and nationalist rule, where today the global market is playing an increasing importance in villagers’ lives. Whilst tourism was first established by the socialist state with one family in one of the villages in the 1960s, most families in both villages willingly participate, or desire to participate, in tourism today. Some of these families have opened their homes to tourists, inviting them to drink tea and have a chat, eat a meal, purchase handicrafts, watch a cultural performance or stay overnight. Not only do the villagers ‘gaze’ upon the tourists but they also use different strategies that highlight the power in hospitality. In this process the private household/domestic sphere becomes public and also part of the global. Focusing on the layout of the house and the role of the family, I look at their interactions with tourists and how they have changed the economic and social organisation of the household in terms of gender relations.
