The Hmong - Essay Sample

Introduction

A people are often defined by their geographical confinements, their cultural norms, and heritage, their social, political and economic activities as well as their beliefs and faiths in different mantras, actions, and religion. These entities usually act as firmly stitched fabrics that hold the communities, societies, groups, families, and individuals together, and they are the very glue that attaches meaning to the lives they live. So, what happens when all these aspects are scraped off the lives of a people who have since forever identified with them? Historical activities like colonization, slavery, the advent of the residential schools and war paused a threat to the fabrics that held the communities and groups of people they targeted, and this led to the loss of the freedom, culture, land and more so the loss of the unity and the meaning of life that these individuals held. The Hmong are a people that can attest to the brutality war has had on their social, economic, religious and political lives and structures. The forced civilization they faced in China as well as the Vietnam War left a majority of them dead, and to those who narrowly escaped death, a future painted with the terrors, memories, and failures associated with the war. This paper, therefore, looks at the history of the Hmong individuals, their cultures, traditions, and activities, then briefly survey the changes they underwent during the Vietnam War and the implications this war had on them as they settled in different parts of the world.

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The Hmong are a group of people who originated from the southeast of Asia and then settle in China along the River Yellow. They existed there for some time until the arrival of the Han Chinese which was preceded by two thousand years of harmonious living. However, completion on the scarce fertile land created disagreements among the two groups, and sooner than the later, the Han raised issues concerning the culture of the Hmong as being weak and wicked. They demanded the Hmong to assimilate into their culture, something that made the Hmong migrate to Laos. The name Hmong translated to the words free people, and indeed the Hmong were people who loved and treasure their freedom and autonomy concerning their cultures and the other aspects in their lives (Cha, 1996). The Hmong were primarily agrarian and were hence involved in the rearing of livestock, crops and some cases hunting. They grew crops like vegetables, rice, and yams, and reared pigs among other livestock. The Hmong also did fishing to supplement their agricultural products (Moua, 2002). The food they produced from their farms were meant to sustain their families and communities. They, therefore, spent most hours of their days in their farms, with their children being their sources of labor. In their society, schooling was an irrelevant part of their lives, and hence the children rarely attended school, if at all any did. Their economic activities were closely tied to their culture.

Marriage was a crucial piece of the cultural fabric of the Hmong, and it involved the extraction, so to call it, of a teenage girl from their homes. This was a crucial yet excruciating part of the Hmong culture, as the women and girls had to leave their families, homes, religions, and their works to join new families whose whereabouts they had no clue of. The tight family ties held by the Hmong would often make this process less stressful and worthwhile, but this was not always the case. The women could sometimes fall in homes that resented them, to families that excluded them and to fates that doomed them (Moua, 2002). Sex was an act that was considered sacred, and hence an unspoken word among the unmarried, as well as the married. Dating was never a part of the marriage process, as the stringent parents often believed that their teenagers, upon knowing and understanding the aspects of marriage, more so sex, they would go ahead and take part in them. This issue was not only confined to the villages the Hmong lived in, but also in the different areas and countries they immigrated in. A woman once narrated of being forced to marry a boy who had taken her to a date at Burger King, and upon returning home was sent off to get married to the man (Mote, 2004). Sexuality was highly respected or maybe dreaded, as it was hard for the members of the ethnic group to speak of issues like menstruation. Sex was viewed as an act that was not just for pleasure, but one that connoted responsibilities to those involved in it. The structure of the Hmong society was gradually disintegrating due to the constant migration and war.

The strength of the Hmong society was the strength of every individual within it, and this made the family a crucial unit in the overall functioning of the community at large. The families functioned through a system of division of labor, where the women and the girls mostly did the home chores, while the men and the boys hunted and fished. However, agriculture was done by both the men and the women as this was the one activity that guaranteed the welfare and the survival of the Hmong. While this might have been a greatly stratified society, it was not a firmly established one. The different wars that rose in the region, more so the Vietnam War of the communists versus the guerrilla soldiers. Fathers and husbands were forcibly or voluntarily taken to be soldiers, leaving behind their families, with no certainty of seeing them again. Wives were literary married to the families of their husbands, while the children constantly lived in fear of attacks as well as the loss of their parents. The war killed many, and left thousands homeless and on the run for safety. As if all these structural and cultural disorientation were not brutal enough, some Hmong individuals who qualified to seek refuge in the United States, Thailand and other states and nations had to say goodbye to their neighbors, their clan members, and their entire lives to state anew in a country they knew nothing about.

America has always been about living the dream, but this popular notion was as strange to the Hmong as the environment in itself was. The geographical, political, social, cultural and economic climate the Hmong experienced in the United States was in every aspect the opposite of what they were used to, and this made their assimilation, or rather their adaptation to this environment difficult. The standards of living, lifestyle and the means of survival in this new environment was a challenge for them as they were typically agrarian and not used to the capitalistic economic states in America. While some of them found a way to get an education, blend into the economy and get white or blue collar jobs, most of the Hmong people embraced their agrarian ways, found land and started growing crops and rearing animals to satisfy their economic needs (Mote, 2004). However, things were different in America as the children had to attend school. Many Americans would define the American dream as proper housing, a terrific job, good education for the children and security among other needs. However, the vision for the Hmong was to produce enough crops and animal products to last them a year or so. Their past was in many ways dictating their present and future in this land of dreams, and it was only through their reconciliation with the history would they be able to have a valuable present and future.

The Vietnam War had a lot of impacts on the Hmong, not only on the battlefields but also in the different regions they sought refuge. This was left some maimed, others lost their loved ones, and their children while others were condemned in a constant state of terror, worry, and disillusionment. The Hmong often face episodes of PTSD, while others resort to drugs to get past the feeling and somewhat have healthy lives. The families of these individuals are usually dominated with utter sadness and hopelessness, couple up with violence as some members who had been directly or indirectly affected by the war resort to violence due to the hardships they went through. For these individuals who relive the war every single day of their lives, the future holds no significance to them, and hence a phenomenon like the American dream is merely an illusion on their side. Theirs is a future that was long ago doomed.

The immigration of the Hmong into the United States created a pool of cultural diversity, as they brought forth their cultures, mode of dressing, social norms and values, as well as their economic specialization. This diversity has gradually made the United States a great cosmopolitan nation, and one that is an ideal representation of the entire world. The numerous Thai restaurants, the pears and other agricultural products produced by the Hmong, the ethnic diversity, and their cultural dances, embroidery and values have figuratively introduced a new stroke on the painting that is America. However, the Hmong hold specific values such as gender disparity, the uncontrolled bearing of children and the anti-capitalistic approach to the economy that has significantly limited their development and thriving in the United States. The big family sizes often limit their financial capacity, while their agrarian economic nature limited their engagement in the labor force. The Hmong are less than a third of the labor force, with a majority of them accruing an amount of $14,276, half that earned by the non-Asian counterparts (Mote, 2004). With some of their cultures limiting them, the more flexible individuals are forced to adapt to this new environment, and it is for this reason that the males can work as dishwashers, even though not proud of it, as long as the welfare of their families is at stake. Life to those who are already in the safe haven has been challenging yet worthwhile, but what happens to those who are still under the jaws of conflict, war, and violence?

The selective absorption of the Hmong into America and other parts of the world left a significant number of the victims of the continuous war in the Laos part of Asia. These individuals were never lucky enough to escape their fates of doom, and therefore, as a gesture of the goodwill and the patriotism the Hmong within the United States had accrued, a portion of the population pushed for the addressing of the agony their fellows were going through in Laos. Even though the evidence and arguments presented by these delegates were not convincing enough to for the united nations to initiate an evacuation plan for the Hmong back in Laos, it was clear that the conditions they were in were wanting (Hmong Today, 2005). The United Nations, however, launched an operation aimed at eradicating the social, ethnic, political and economic injustices in Laos via the Lao People's Democratic Party through the eradication of poverty within the rural areas and the vulnerable ethnic groups.

The Hmong have often been a distinct group within the United States due to their outstanding culture and traditions. However, the hardships they were going through while in the United States, as well as before their immigration made this group an interesting one historically. For a people who valued their families and societies the disintegration that came with war, displacement and migration affected so much, that they could barely thrive even after being rescued from the fangs of violence and war. History is a connection of the past, the present, and the future, and it has been well illustrated that unless these aspects of an individual's life are at equilibrium or are reconciled, there is not much that can go on in their different undertakings. By connecting the past and the present situations and circumstances the Hmong live in, it is possible to state that their future is guaranteed to be less painful, less traumatic and more successful.

References

Cha D. (1996). Dia's s...