Welcome to the upcoming episode of Fulbright Speakers’ Series: The World beyond a Book. Next Saturday, we will have an interesting discussion with author Pham Van Hung on and beyond his book “Culture of Sexuality in Vietnam from the 10th – 19th Centuries”.
‘Sexuality’ is a topic that may be easily talked about casually but is rarely perceived as a complex variable in the Vietnamese cultural structure which is worth researching, analyzing and discussing. Moreover, while ‘sexuality’ has become a prominent topic of contemporary literature, attracting researchers and critics to study about in the current context, Dr. Pham Van Hung went against the tide to ‘rebuild’ Vietnamese culture of sexuality in the medieval period. It can be said that “Culture of Sexuality in Vietnam from the 10th – 19th Centuries” is an important effort to enrich national archives which can, to some extent, change the limited understanding of today’s readers on their ancestors’ culture of sexuality.
In the talk, author Pham Van Hung will share and discuss some contents of his book: How sexual identity is ‘controlled’ by law and norms; The positioning and circulation of ‘sexuality’ as the exchange currency; Sexual fantasies and tendencies, and most importantly, the ‘protagonist’ of this work – ‘The sex life’. This section gives answers to the following questions: In the history of Vietnam in the 10th – 19th centuries, what standards of male and female beauty existed? What were Xuan hoa (pornography) and Xuan duoc (aphrodisiac) at that period? Were ‘pornographic books’ popular?; And what were the sexual techniques to achieve a pleasure and prolong life?
Towards the understanding of not only contemporary issues but also the ‘gray spots’ in Vietnamese culture and history, Fulbright University Vietnam is pleased to hold a discussion with author Pham Van Hung on his publication “Culture of Sexuality in Vietnam from the 10th to 19th Centuries”, to together enrich our knowledge about the sexuality in Vietnam medieval period.
Join this interesting discussion with Fulbright University Vietnam and Dr. Pham Van Hung at:
⏰ 9:30 – 11:00 AM on Saturday, December 11, 2021 (Vietnam time, GMT +7)
👉 Register at: https://bit.ly/FSS_TSPhamVanHung
The link to join the webinar will be sent to your registered email 24 hours before the event.
Fulbright Speakers’ Series is a quest for knowledge and understanding with diverse incisive viewpoints of prominent authors, both in Vietnam and globally, venturing into a myriad of topics ranging from development history and current Vietnam in the context of globalization.
About the speaker: Doctor of Literature Pham Van Hung was born in 1983. He was awarded the First Prize of Vietnam Young Science Talent Award by the Ministry of Education and Training in 2014. He is currently a lecturer at the Faculty of Literature, University of Social Science and Humanities, Hanoi National University. His main research topics are on Middle and Modern Vietnamese Literature; Comparative study of East Asian literature; Literature in relation to culture; Gender and sexuality issues in literature, culture,…
Besides “Culture of Sexuality in Vietnam from the 10th to 19th Centuries” (2018, second edition with revision in 2019), until now, he has published “The study of Literary Inquisition of the 10th to 19th Centuries in Vietnam” (2013, second edition with revision in 2015), “Autobiography of Virginity: The Female Role Models in Vietnamese Medieval Literature of the 10th to 19th Centuries” (2016) and most recently, “Theory and Practice of Composing Poetry” (2020).
