Study marriage brokerage in Vietnam

From: Hsun-Hui Tseng <hui1022@u.washington.edu>

Date: Oct 15, 2006 12:40 PM

Subject: [Vsg] Study marriage brokerage in Vietnam

Dear VSGers,

I'm a Ph.D student in Anthropology doing research on the business of transnational brokering marriages in Taiwan. Many of you may have known that one out of every five marriages in Taiwan is transnational now, and most of the transnational marriages are between Taiwanese men and Vietnamese women. To investigate further how the business works in Vietnam, I'm planning to go to Vietnam to do my fieldwork. I have visited there once with a marriage group last year with a tourist Visa, but since I need to stay longer than one month this time, I know I need to look for a local institute as a sponsor for the visa matter. Now what I'm concerned about is whom I should contact. I don't know which institute in Hanoi would be able to help me with the study. Moreover, I heard from a friend that I would be assigned a person to accompany me while I'm doing research. If it's true, then I would be in great trouble. As far as I know, private marriage brokerage seems not to be legal in Vietnam (or I should say "illegal"?), while it's totally ok in Taiwan. According to my previous experience, local matchmakers in Vietnam kept their occupation as a secret to their friends, and they were afraid of polices, or people they thought to be "representatives of the government" appearing in the venue where matchmaking is held. Basically I have established good relationships with some of the local matchmakers and don't want to destroy them just because I take an" untrustworthy outsider" into their secret life. I have no idea what to do would be better for my informants and my stay in Vietnam. I appreciate if any of you could give me some suggestions. Thanks!

Hsun-Hui

From: Nicolas Lainez <niklainez@yahoo.com>

Date: Oct 16, 2006 11:27 AM

Subject: Re: [Vsg] Study marriage brokerage in Vietnam

Dear Hsun-Hui,

I'm a Spanish student leaving between France and

Vietnam. I plan to start a PhD program related to debt

and human trafficking in the Mekong delta next year.

I'm just coming back from Saigon where I spend 6

months doing a research on migration topics for the

International Organisation for Migration.

There are number of Vietnamese organizations

adressing the Taiwanese issue. It's "a la mode" and

State, media and mass organizations such as Women's

Union are very concerned about the issue, that is

starting to drive to Souht Korea.

The Southern Institute of Social Sciences, and also

at the sociology department of HCMC social sciences

and humanities huniversity are engaged on research

about your topic (Prof Phan An for the first, Prof Kim

Xuyen fot the second). The NGO CARAM Vietnam also

conducted research. IOM Vietnam is also adressing the

issue. The Southern universities are the most

appropriate to sponsor student visas, but you need to

sign an agreement for a collaboration mutually

beneficial first.

Access to field is restricted and you need strong

connections to access rural people. Since most of the

women marrying Taiwanese are from Mekong delta (the

ones from the North marry Chinese), I would recommend

to approach orgs and universities based in Saigon.

Here is the contact of a French researcher, Caroline

Grillot, engaged on a PhD program about cross-border

marriages between Northen Vietnamese and Chinese :

carolinegrillot@hotmail.com. She may have better ideas

than me for the North.

Please feel free to request doc, contacts or any

other info to me.

Best regards,

Nicolas Lainez

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