Search results for ""Author Christoph Giebel""
University of Washington Press Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communism: Ton Duc Thang and the Politics of History and Memory
Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communisim illuminates the real and imagined lives of Ton Duc Thang (1888–1980), a celebrated revolutionary activist and Vietnamese communist icon, but it is much more than a conventional biography. This multifaceted study constitutes the first detailed re-evaluation of the official history of the Vietnamese Communist Party and is a critical analysis of the inner workings of Vietnamese historiography never before undertaken in its scope. In prominence and public visibility second only to Ho Chi Minh, whom he succeeded in the presidency, Ton Duc Thang in fact lacked any real power. Author Christoph Giebel reconciles this seeming contradiction by showing that it was only Ton Duc Thang who could personify for the Party crucial legitimizing “ancestries”: those that linked Vietnamese communism with the Russian October Revolution, highlighted proletarian internationalism among its ranks, and rooted the Party in Viet Nam’s south. The study traces the decades-long, complex processes in which famous heroic episodes in Ton Duc Thang’s life were manipulated or simply fabricated and—depending on prevailing historical and political necessities—utilized as propaganda by the Communist Party. Over time, narrative control over these tales switched hands, however, and since the late 1950s the stories came to be used in factional disputes by competing ideological and regional interests within the revolutionary camp. Based on innovative archival research in Viet Nam and France and on analyses of biographical writings, propaganda, and museum representations, the study challenges core assumptions about the history of the Vietnamese Communist Part and sheds light on divisions within the revolutionary movement along regional, class, and ideological lines. Giebel uses the fictions and contested facts of Ton’s life to demonstrate that history-writing and the constructions of memories and identities are always political acts.
£84.60
University of Washington Press Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communism: Ton Duc Thang and the Politics of History and Memory
Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communisim illuminates the real and imagined lives of Ton Duc Thang (1888–1980), a celebrated revolutionary activist and Vietnamese communist icon, but it is much more than a conventional biography. This multifaceted study constitutes the first detailed re-evaluation of the official history of the Vietnamese Communist Party and is a critical analysis of the inner workings of Vietnamese historiography never before undertaken in its scope. In prominence and public visibility second only to Ho Chi Minh, whom he succeeded in the presidency, Ton Duc Thang in fact lacked any real power. Author Christoph Giebel reconciles this seeming contradiction by showing that it was only Ton Duc Thang who could personify for the Party crucial legitimizing “ancestries”: those that linked Vietnamese communism with the Russian October Revolution, highlighted proletarian internationalism among its ranks, and rooted the Party in Viet Nam’s south. The study traces the decades-long, complex processes in which famous heroic episodes in Ton Duc Thang’s life were manipulated or simply fabricated and—depending on prevailing historical and political necessities—utilized as propaganda by the Communist Party. Over time, narrative control over these tales switched hands, however, and since the late 1950s the stories came to be used in factional disputes by competing ideological and regional interests within the revolutionary camp. Based on innovative archival research in Viet Nam and France and on analyses of biographical writings, propaganda, and museum representations, the study challenges core assumptions about the history of the Vietnamese Communist Part and sheds light on divisions within the revolutionary movement along regional, class, and ideological lines. Giebel uses the fictions and contested facts of Ton’s life to demonstrate that history-writing and the constructions of memories and identities are always political acts.
£27.99
The University Press of Kentucky Southern Voices: Biet Dong and the National Liberation Front
Southern Voices: Biet Dong and the National Liberation Front presents oral histories from former members of an elite squad of Viet Cong operatives, focusing on their experiences during what is known, in Vietnam, as the American War. Author Michael Robert Dedrick conducted interviews with eight former Biet Dong (the equivalent of Ranger or Special Forces divisions in the US military) and sheds new light on this clandestine group.Best known for their role in the 1968 Tet Offensive, the Biet Dong in the south were organized units hiding in plain sight. Members included farmers, tradespeople, agents, spies, monks, students, intellectuals, and journalists - both young and old, men and women. They were highly patriotic, politically motivated, and very secretive, operating in three-person cells under aliases. Their voices and experiences emerge in this bilingual volume.In recent years, historians have made greater use of Vietnamese primary sources and transformed the study of one of the twentieth century's most controversial conflicts. Ably curated by Dedrick - who also offers his own perspectives as a veteran and peace activist - the firsthand accounts in Southern Voices add a new layer to the history of the Vietnam War and its aftermath.
£28.95
