Gender Roles in Vietnam

Referring to the late 1920s and early 1930s, women were seen as the common housewife. This image was depicted across many media platforms. The customary role of women, was to be in charge of running the household. This included polishing, vacuuming, dusting, dishes, laundry and other tasks which needed to be maintained on a weekly or daily basis. It became a full day workload, keeping her constantly busy as if she were employed. It was required for the women of the household to be prepared for anything her husband or family desired. Housework was typically expected to only include maintenance, however, this was not the case. Cooking, cleaning, and overall upkeep was all to be completed by the wife, while the man of the house brought in the money.

I remember in my stereotype class that I took last summer, where we talked about gender roles and the equality of gender roles. Me, myself, coming from a Hmong cultural background, we had important culture about gender roles. The Hmong comes from parts of Laos and Thailand. The Hmong living in Laos and Thailand were really poor and uneducated. The Hmong lived as farmers had very important gender roles. For example, man had to work for money and hunt for food while woman stayed home to cook, babysit, and clean. Man were educated and women were housewives. When some of the Hmong immigrated to the United States, they continued the gender roles as Man able to work and be educated while women had to stay home to cook and babysit. The Hmong brought

Throughout history, women have been groomed to be the best they can domestically. To place them in the man’s position of being the sole provider of the family seems irrational at best. Although the natural gender roles may be overpowering during the start of having a family, through time duties between husband and wife, regarding domestic life, tend to balance out once financial security is established. Like many major changes, it starts out bumpy but eventually a solution is found and both husband and wife find their “happy-medium.”

In Vietnam, women have traditionally been placed in positions of marginalization, where they were secondary to the males in power and expected to be completely subservient to men in every way. The morality of the society dictates that a woman be kind and quiet, that she takes care of the household and that she holds no higher ambition than to serve her husband and raise his children. Women who do not conform to these characteristics are considered wicked and made miserable. Their unhappiness, instead of being laid at the feet

“Look at us! We’re just like everyone else. We’ve bought into the same ridiculous delusion; this idea that you have to settle down and resign from life.” (April Wheeler, Revolutionary Road). It has become a society norm that women are meant to serve housewives; to cook, clean, garden, and nurture children, even though they are much more capable of other things. The role of women is greatly overseen, as they are not perceived to be of their full potential, rather than as societies idealistic expectation. This is because men and those who are wealthy are unable to look past gender and accept women as of equal significance.

The treatment of the male gender role is altogether different from that of the female gender role, and this issue has turned out to be important. Gender roles were extraordinarily changed in the 1950s, with the men returning from war and taking their occupations back. Females had, throughout World War II, taken men’s occupations while they had been away at war. After the war, numerous women needed to keep their occupations. Instead, a considerable amount of them got to be spouses and moms as the men returned from the war. For example, the male spouses were away at work for most the day while the wives would need to do a decent measure of the manual work around the house. The type of chores could have been cleaning, cooking, or other tasks the female spouses handled. These adjustments in the home might not have been viewed as positive but rather they were for women. Ladies truly advanced in the fifties with finding new openings for work and discovering their place in the world. Therefore, two articles explain further in detail about the

Whether it is the past or the present, there have always been gender roles in society. In most homes, it is the woman’s responsibility to take care of the house. This includes cleaning, meal preparations, raising and taking care of the children as well as the husband. Compared to the men who take care of the more physical activities, such as yard work. It was known throughout many years that it was a woman’s responsibility to stay in the house while the man would go out and look for work to provide money for his family. Although the intensity of gender roles has changed, it still exists.

“Not all women wore love beads in the sixties.”(Officer, Nurse, Woman) Many women volunteered for their spots in the war; they didn’t just want to sit at home and do nothing. These women saved our husbands, sons, and brothers. They fought for their families in their own way. Women volunteers became heroes. Women were important to the Vietnam war from being nurses, warriors, and rescuing children from the terrors of war.

During the Vietnam War, many challenges were faced by the Vietnamese people no matter what side they fought for. In Hayslip’s book and in the movie Regret to Inform, we are able to gain insight into some of the struggles the women faced during the war. The men went to war and left the women with nothing but a number of challenges. Problems arose because the women were being abused and tortured. To make matters worse, a lot of the women had to deal with more difficulties after the war was over. These are just a few of the struggles that women had to face during and after the Vietnam War.

It has been experienced from time immemorial that there has always lain a very big and noticeable gap in the roles that both women and men play in the everyday societal developments. The issue according to most of the renowned researches is more elusive to the women as they are the ones that are mostly faced by the double standards in the society and this could include very harsh challenges as far as economic and financial status is concerned. Some of the roles of women in the society and more typically, in the house-hold, were very much considered inferior as compared to that of the men who in addition, were given an upper hand

The article “Clashing Dreams: Highly Educated Overseas Brides and Low-Wage U.S. Husbands” discusses the trend of marriages between highly educated women living in Vietnam and under-employed, low-income Vietnamese men living overseas. Both of these groups are unmarriageable by traditional Vietnamese standards. The women are generally older, in their late twenties to early thirties, with college educations and lucrative jobs. They view the pool of marriageable men in Vietnam to be underachieving and disrespectful of women. Conversely, Viet Kieu men, Vietnamese men who live in other countries, are seen as more respectful of women, and less controlling, since they live in more westernized countries. The Viet Kieu men, ironically, are looking for women who have been subject to fewer western influences than the women in the countries where they live, and who are more traditional. These men believe that women from Vietnam

Women and men have had certain roles in society that were understood amongst them to be specified for their particular gender. Males were known to have the leading role as head of the house hold and the bread winner while the woman’s duty was to stay at home and take care of the house and children. While many people years ago deemed this way of life and practice to be the right and ethical thing to do, times have changed and so this kind of treatment towards a woman’s equality must be questioned. Even though times have changed, this mindset of a woman’s ability to be as good as a man has not completely gone away. In today’s society a woman contributes to the economy and her family as equally as that of a man. Therefore, women should share equal rights and opportunities as their gender counterparts.

Society today places many ideals when it comes to proper behaviours regarding gender roles. These are considered societal norms that are widely debated and controversial. Society has created a norm, which encompasses specific expectations and rules that change the daily lives of men and women, giving them specific tasks and behaviours to abide by. These standards are known as gender roles, which are defined as distinguishing actions, thoughts, and feelings of males and females. Gender roles are said to be a result of nature, which is a natural process, every male or female is to follow. On the other hand it can be a result of nurture, which changes ones way of thinking and adapting their lifestyle to fit their environment. Either way gender roles are a part of someone’s life from the moment of their birth, as they develop, and long after that, this proves that gender roles are influential to a person’s life and development. This essay examines how media such as music, family life, and different parenting styles encompass gender roles and teaches behaviours regarding them. Therefore, gender roles define males and females are a result of nurture and not nature.

The diversities within North Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia (cultural, religious, political, etc.) play a crucial part in the status of women and the key features of gender roles in these particular geographic regions. The Middle East and North Africa share commonalities through Arabic and Islamic culture. Establishing equalities for women amongst the current social and political changes of Middle Eastern and North African societies stands as a difficult obstacle to overcome, but in spite of this, women’s rights efforts are still being made. While Islamic culture is dominant in Southeast Asia, the culture of Southeast Asian nations is diverse. Islam and gender in Southeast Asia have contributed to the continuing debate over Islam, feminism, and gender rights in the region. The cultures of North Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia are male dominated, but this cultural dominance might not sustain in the future. This essay will compare and contrast the current status of women and the key features of gender roles in North Africa and the Middle East with those of Southwest Asia. Examples will also be provided to justify any arguments that are made.

Before examining particular societies, the general notions of patriarchy must be established. Generally, women were considered inferior to men, but each facet of society provides a distinctive insight into gender roles. A fundamental difference between the two genders was that the responsibility of a man was to be a member of the public, whereas the responsibility of a woman was to be in the home. Social norms defined men as “rulers, warriors, scholars, and heads of households” (Ways of the World 59). Even if a man had little