Vietnamese Betel The Sisu Its Significance For Interpretation

The betel nut is one of the products found in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Southern China including Taiwan. Betel chewing culture has a long history and indeed flourished in China, India, Sri Lanka, and in Southeast Asia countries such as Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.Nowadays, betel chewing custom has declined in Southern China. Several Taiwanese scholars believe that betel chewing is the identity symbol of their indigenous culture. However, the cultural meaning of this custom has been dimmed in today Taiwanese's modern life and reduced to that of just refreshment or entertainment product. The situation in Vietnam is different. Vietnamese betel chewing culture, rich with strong sense of ethnic culture, still deeply influences spiritual life of Vietnamese people.Betel chewing custom has its different fates in Southern China and Vietnam. This fact proves that this is cultural symbolic meaning of betel chewing that decides whether it will survive or not. Why does the symbolic meaning of betel chewing have so profound influence in the lives of Vietnamese? What impact does it have on their mindset and social life? This is undoubtedly an interesting research topic. Starting from the related historical and cultural documents, combining it with the first-hand materials from the field work, this thesis attempts to interpret the Vietnamese's betel chewing custom and its cultural symbolic meaning from the point of view of cultural relativity and cultural holism.Vietnamese case shows that apart from having practical effects, material culture including betel chewing custom also has spiritual functions attached to it by people. Material functions could change, thus if we only pay attention to the material aspect but neglect the spiritual value, any culture would be difficult to be inherited This brings us understanding that the soul of cultural inheritance depends on how the spiritual value of culture is transmitted. This is also the idea behind ancient Chinese saying "rectification and sincerity", Claude Levi—Strauss's "structural anthropology" as well as Ferdinand Toennies's "community spirit".This thesis consists of four chapters:The First chapter explains the origin of topic of this research; summarizes related documents on betel chewing custom as well as the theories and methods adopted in this thesis.In the Second chapter, according to the Chinese ancient documents, we review the history of betel chewing custom in Southeast Asia and Southern China. The following part of this chapter shows the fates of this custom in contemporary societies of Southeast Asia countries and Southern China including Taiwan and try analyzing the deep causes of its "rise and decline".The Third chapter discusses betel chewing in Vietnam, paying attention to its social and cultural symbolic value. Betel was initially a kind of plant used for refreshment only. But in the process of social contacts, it gradually became a traditional addiction for the Vietnamese. Later on, due to its ritual function, this custom went deeply into the Vietnamese's spiritual life and eventually got a prominent symbolic meaning. This chapter at the same time presents the modern situation with regards to betel chewing, as observed and understood by the author during her field work in Hanoi, in Due Dong County of Tien Du Prefecture of Bac Ninh Province and in Tra Kot County of Bac Tra Mi Prefecture of Quang Nam Province of Vietnam. Basing on the comparison between the different fates of the betel chewing custom in contemporary Southeast Asia and Southern China and the analysis of its deep reason, the Forth chapter reaches the conclusion similar to that made by Clifford Geertz:"Man is an animal suspended in webs of significance himself". Man, as the wisest of all creatures, is most good at creating, understanding, interchanging, operating and inheriting symbolic products. The products he needs for his regular existence, including the material ones used for "nourishing his health", all have cultural symbolic functions themselves. Therefore, the soul of ethnic cultural heritage is its internal cultural meaning and symbolic value, not the exterior object. Thus, the fate of ethnic cultural heritage is not decided by specified objects but depends on the process of weaving and creating, practicing and interflowing, inheriting and reappearing the specified cultural values and meanings. Under the pressure of the mankind's modern utilitarism, especially the pressure of "new five-zation"("新五化")(marketization, urbanization, industrialization, informatization and globalization), no material object can be inherited for long. Yet, humankind's ability and need of creating, interchanging and inheriting cultural values in order to embody their subjectivity will never change. Thus, the cultural diversity of humankind can be neither restrained nor eliminated. That being so, we are engaged in material culture research is for understanding its non-material meanings and symbolic values expressed in a specified ethnic culture, and then we can understand and appreciate the ability to create the cultural diversity of mankind. The inheritance of betel chewing custom among different ethnic groups in Vietnam today has not only shown the diversity of Vietnamese betel chewing custom but also enriched Vietnamese ethnic culture. And it is the contribution to the cultural inheritance of mankind at the same time.