France in Indochina : Colonial Encounters

Rating:
Summary: Excellent and interesting
Review: I had to read this book for my class and I thought that it was really great insight. I also loved how Ms. Cooper includes the French original text in the book. I recomend this book to anyone who is interested in Indochina or French culture.

Rating:
Summary: Where are the English subtitles?
Review: Like the previous reviewer, I had to read this book for a class. The book gives the view of Indochina from the French perspective. Relying on novels, newspapers, movies and other items of popular culture, the author shows how French culture created an image of Indochina and dealt with their first colonial defeat. Chapters include discussions of the French Exhibition of 1931 and the role of gender in the cultural image of Indochina and a number of fairly sophisticated historiographical arguments. The author does a good job of summarizing each of her points which is extremely beneficial since this is not a book for the casual reader.

I felt that in some areas the author was stretching her points but perhaps that makes the book more provacative. My one major criticism is the constant injection of long paragraphs in French with no English translations. The previous reviewer found that aspect of the book beneficial. Perhaps he or she is bilingual and able to read the French. Most English readers are not. I felt that I lost a great deal because I was unable to read the quotations. Would it have been so hard to footnote those quotes in English since the book was published for an English speaking audience?

Rating:
Summary: Good although incomplete review.
Review: The author proposes to review the colonial effort in Indochina between 1867 and1954. She discusses the conquest, building, transforming and marketing of these colonies. She then discusses the work of the colonizers and the role of native and French women in the colonies. The work ends with the battle of Dien Bien Phu, the exodus of the boat people, and the revisiting of Indochina.

She did not go into details about the exploitation of the country resources or of the natives, except to mention about French brutal colonial past. One error is to think that the Vietnamese presently living in France were submissive and apolitical. My feeling is that they were not as interested in French as in Vietnamese politics, therefore were not vocal about French state affairs (see Bousquet: Behind the Bamboo hedge).