Vietnam's many faces

Vietnam’s cultural diversity is a major selling point with tourists of all places. Specifically, visitors like to ride up to Sa Pa to brush up with the Hill tribes.

Although there are some major social issues resulting with the rise of mass tourism in this area, the experience can definitely a major highlight of your trip and is more then worthwhile. So should you decide to brush up with the montagnards, we recommend looking for smaller agencies that have the well being of the community at heart. We traveled with Freewheelin and can only recommend them (see previous post).

In the article below, you’ll find a little more information on the country’s different tribes.
Enjoy it!

H.

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There are many sides to any culture. Vietnam alone is rich with 53 minority ethnic groups. Counting approximately 11 millions inhabitants, the hill tribes – also called Montagnards - count for 14% of the country’s total population. Each with there own culture and way of life, they are divided in eight different ethno linguistic groups of five major linguistic families.

First there is the Austro-Asia family, which includes the Viet-Muong and Khmer-Muong groups. Regrouping 24 different tribes, this linguistic family is the most important of the country. Then we find the austronesian language family, with five different ethnic groups, and the thai-kadai family in which we found 12 ethnic groups. The sino-tibetan family counts for nine different ethnic groups. Last but not least, the Hmong-Dao family counts “only” three different ethnic groups but is none the less the largest group of Vietnam population wise.

The hill tribes have an ambivalent status in the country. On the one hand, their rights are officially recognised by the Vietnamese Socialist Party: “The State of the socialist Republic of Vietnam represents the unified State made up of all nationalities cohabiting on the Vietnamese territory. The State applies the policy of equality, unit and mutual assistance between nationalities and formally prohibits any act of discrimination and national division. Nationalities have the right to speak and write in their language, to preserve their identity like promoting their noble habits, their rites, their traditions and their culture"

The hill tribes are also well represented in the media with frequent articles on their culture and the different challenges they face. But these good words don’t seem to help with the daily poverty issue many of them face. In fact, more then 75% of all hill tribes people live in poverty whereas only 30% of the viets face the same difficulties. (Viets are members of the kinhs ethnic groups whereas Vietnamese in use to name all the country’s inhabitants. NDLR)

But in spite of the many obstacles resulting from their precarious economical situation, it is the threat of acculturation that remains their biggest challenge. Several factors are to be taken into account when trying to understand this “vietnamisation” of their way of life.

The use of Vietnamese language in school is a major issue. Another important factor is the immaterial aspect of a major part of the cultural heritage of these tribes. Moreover, only about thirty tribes have their own writing, which therefore complicates even more the safeguarding intangible heritage’s question.
Finally, the financial amounts allocated for the protection of each ethnic group’s inheritance is defined according to the size (population count) of each group. In short, the smaller the group is, the smaller the amount is.

That being said, several initiatives were recently put in place to ensure the cultural perennity of these people. Among those, the publication of books in original ethnic language, and the possibility, for certain tribes, to receive part of their educations in their mother tongue are expected to have great impacts.
In addition, the Socialist Party approached the UNESCO in order to officially recognise some hill tribes practice as official intangible world heritage. Already, the gongs culture of the central highlands Tan Nguyen tribe received the precious title. Whether this new title will actually lead to real and concrete actions for the moment still remains to be seen.

Visit
We highly recommend a visit to Hanoi

Ethnographic museum to learn more about the hill tribes. Rich with many documents and interesting display – an exterior garden allows us to visit different tribes traditional houses – the permanent collection is a must!
Hanoi Ethnographic museum
Corner of Nguyen Du & Le Duan st
Phone: 0084 (4) 850 42 66
Entry fee