Wynn Wilcox – författare

Moving beyond past histories of Viet Nam that have focused on nationalist struggle, this volume brings together work by scholars who are re-examining centuries of Vietnamese history. Crossing borders and exploring ambiguities, the essays in ""Viet Nam: Borderless Histories"" draw on international archives and bring a range of inventive analytical approaches to the global, regional, national, and local narratives of Vietnamese history. Among the topics explored are the extraordinary diversity between north and south, lowland and highland, Viet and minority, and between colonial, Chinese, Southeast Asian, and dynastic influences. The result is an exciting new approach to Southeast Asia's past that uncovers the complex and rich history of Viet Nam.

This sound interpretation of Vietnamese cultural attitudes contends that a major reason for American difficulties in Viet-Nam has been the failure to appreciate how wide the gulf is between Viet-Nam and the West. Professor Smith first describes Vietnamese political and social traditions and shows how they were challenged by the West after 1858. He examines Viet-Nam's search for independence and modernization in the first half of this century, contrasts the two governments of the partitioned country during the years 1954-1963, and stresses the critical need to reassess attitudes toward Viet-Nam. His sophisticated, ambitious survey of Viet-Nam history will have a lasting value that sets it apart from the scores of ephemeral books on this country.