Home / Temple Festivals And

Social capital in the Va Temple festival in Son Tay town, Hanoi city - 1


MINISTRY OF CULTURE, SPORTS AND TOURISM

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

Maybe you are interested!

Social capital in the Va Temple festival in Son Tay town, Hanoi city - 1

HANOI UNIVERSITY OF CULTURE


NGUYEN THUY LINH


SOCIAL CAPITAL IN TEMPLE FESTIVALS AND

IN SON TAY TOWN, HANOI CITY


Major: Cultural Studies

Code: 9229040


DOCTORAL THESIS IN CULTURAL STUDIES


Scientific supervisor: 1. Associate Professor, Dr. Bui Hoai Son

2. Associate Professor, Dr. Duong Van Sau


HANOI - 2022

COMMITMENT


The author hereby declares that this is his own research work under the scientific guidance of Associate Professor, Dr. Bui Hoai Son and Associate Professor, Dr. Duong Van Sau. The research results and conclusions in the thesis are honest, not copied from any source and in any form. The references to the documents have been cited and cited according to regulations. I take full responsibility for this declaration.

Thesis author


Nguyen Thuy Linh


INDEX

COMMITMENT

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 2

LIST OF TABLES, DIAGRAMS 3

INTRODUCTION 4

Chapter 1: OVERVIEW OF THE RESEARCH PROBLEM, THEORETICAL BASIS AND OVERVIEW OF THE TEMPLE FESTIVAL AND 12

1.1. Overview of research problem 12

1.2. Theoretical basis 29

1.3. Overview of the Va Temple Festival 41

Summary 52

Chapter 2: SOCIAL CAPITAL FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF STATE MANAGEMENT IN TEMPLE FESTIVALS AND 53

2.1. Managing beliefs and strengthening political ideology 53

2.2. Legitimizing the organizational role and expanding social relations 60

2.3. “Traditional creativity” and social division of labor 69

Summary 80

Chapter 3: SOCIAL CAPITAL FROM THE COMMUNITY PERSPECTIVE IN THE TEMPLE FESTIVAL AND81

3.1. Social capital in the Va Temple festival from an economic perspective 81

3.2. Social capital in the Va Temple festival from a cultural perspective 86

3.3. Social capital in the Va Temple festival from a symbolic perspective 107

Summary 113

Chapter 4: SOME ISSUES DISCUSSING SOCIAL CAPITAL IN TEMPLE FESTIVALS AND 115

4.1. The triangle of relations between the State, community and social capital 115

4.2. Trends of change of social capital in the current Va Temple festival 134

Summary 146

CONCLUSION 147

LIST OF AUTHOR'S PUBLISHED RESEARCH WORKS RELATED TO THE THESIS TOPIC 151

REFERENCES 152

APPENDIX 164


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS


Abbreviation Full text

Organizing Committee

Vietnam Fatherland Front

PhD student

Publishing House

Associate Professor

Residential Group

Page

PhD

People's Committee People's Committee

Social Capital Social Capital


LIST OF TABLES AND DIAGRAM

Table 1.1. Main festival procession and festival rules 49

Table 2.1. Actual and legendary administrative units 59

Table 2.2. Monuments associated with legends in Son Tay 59

Table 2.3. Administrative units on paper and original names of villages 76

Table 2.4. Legends associated with the villages surrounding Va Temple 76

Table 3.1. Communal houses worshiping Saint Tan 94

Table 3.2. Festival space at Va Temple 94

Table 3.3. Symbolic system in the Va Temple festival 108

Table 4.1. Assignment of tasks for organizing the Va Temple festival in January 2017 118

Table 4.2. Comparison of the Mother Goddess altar and the Saint Tan altar at Va Temple 139

Table 4.3. Comparison of offerings at the altar of Co Chin and the altar of Duc Thanh Tan 140

Table 4.4. Comparison of the Mother Goddess altar and the Duc Thanh Tan altar 142

Diagram 3.1. From material space to sacred space 91

Diagram 4.1: Model of the impact of social institutions on beliefs and festivals of Va Temple 115

Diagram 4.2: Overview of the diagram of the Temple and 141

INTRODUCTION

1. Reason for choosing the topic

1.1 . Traditional festivals are a type of cultural activity, a spiritual product of the Vietnamese ethnic community, formed and developed over a long historical period. According to incomplete statistics, Vietnam has over 8,000 festivals spread across the three regions of the year, especially concentrated in the North during the Spring and Autumn period. In that diverse treasure trove of festivals, festivals associated with folk beliefs are a cultural phenomenon formed and developed under long-standing historical, cultural and economic conditions. This is one of the unique intangible cultural values ​​in the treasure trove of cultural heritage of our country that needs to be preserved and promoted. Research on festivals associated with folk beliefs is the process of understanding the close and lively relationship between festivals and folk beliefs. Over the past two decades, the practice of religious beliefs has emerged in all rural areas, with a new vitality. The face of festivals appears in a new look with rituals, performances, and ceremonies associated with beliefs. In the general picture of that strong "rise", the scale of festivals has also become larger, the participation of the State and the community has also undergone certain changes. Not only is it a space for religious activities of "our villagers", festivals are now also a space to consolidate the power of the government apparatus, establish social relationships, promote business activities as well as meet the needs of individuals and different groups. These things make us think a lot about the nature of festivals today: is a festival simply a normal cultural activity or an opportunity to connect social relationships? Do members of the community come together only because of the need to find sympathy, because of religious beliefs or also because of economic interests, personal interests? What social context has influenced the diversity of the nature of these relationships? And what do these relationships help them with? Thus, the first and most important reason why the researcher chose this topic for research is due to the nature of the research subject: how does participating in festival organization help the State and the community receive benefits?

1.2. The Va Temple Festival in Son Tay town, Hanoi city has been approached from many different perspectives, in which the studies mainly approach from the literary and cultural perspectives... These approaches have brought great achievements in the research on the Va Temple Festival such as: providing an overview of the formation and development of the worship of Duc Thanh Tan as well as the elements of space, time and ritual process of the Va Temple Festival. However, the obvious limitation in the overview of the documents on the Va Temple Festival is that the sources of documents often only focus on researching the festival itself such as time, space, process as well as the tasks of the members in organizing the festival.


The association seems to pay little attention to studying the basis of formation, expression and benefits from social capital in practicing beliefs and organizing the Va Temple festival. This is an issue that needs to be studied by researchers. The topic: "Social capital in the Va Temple festival in Son Tay town, Hanoi city" is a way to study the way the State and the community create and use social capital.

1.3. In the past two decades, social capital has become a topic that has attracted the attention of many scholars in the world and in the country. Although it is slower than other countries in approaching this concept and theoretical framework, up to now, in Vietnam there have been about a few dozen studies on social capital including articles published in magazines, books, newspapers and theses. Research works have presented different approaches to social capital such as the functions and roles of social capital in terms of policy, the roles of social capital in social control or education in the family and community... Each different perspective will show its own aspects of social capital. Because the nature of beliefs and festivals is formed in traditional agricultural societies and maintained in modern societies with differences in political institutions, State groups and community organizations, if we analyze social media in a folk belief activity, specifically the Va Temple festival, we can analyze the creation method, the role and benefits of the State and the community in relation to social media. In particular, "traditional creation" is a key issue that shows the proactive role of the State and the community in creating and using social media. Therefore, placing the State and the community in these two social contexts to analyze the creation method as well as the benefits that these two groups gain from participating in belief activities as well as organizing and managing the Va Temple festival is an approach that is considered a direction with high theoretical and practical significance.

For the above reasons, the researcher chose "Social capital in the Va Temple festival in Son Tay town, Hanoi city" as the thesis topic.

2. Research purpose and tasks

2.1. Research purpose

Conducting research topics and thesis aims to achieve the following goals: to reveal the basis of formation, expression and benefits of social capital in the Va Temple festival from the past to the present.

2.2. Research tasks

From the above research objectives, the thesis sets out the following research tasks:

Firstly : systematize and analyze the concept of "social capital" and related concepts, describe ethnography of time, space, festival process as well as the formation and layers of cultural meaning of the image of Duc Thanh Tan.


Second: analyze and explain the outstanding characteristics of social capital of the State and community (the basis of formation, expression and benefits). This is the basis for explaining why beliefs and festivals are the environment that helps members of the State and community create and use social capital.

Third : identify and analyze some issues raised by the State and community about social affairs in the Va Temple festival as well as the trend of change and development of social affairs in the Va Temple festival in the future.

3. Research questions and research hypotheses

3.1. Research questions

With the above research purposes, the thesis raises three main research questions:

Firstly , through beliefs and festivals, how has socialism from the State's perspective been formed, expressed and brought about benefits?

Second , through beliefs and festivals, how is social capital formed, expressed and benefits brought about from a community perspective?

Third, what is the two-way relationship between the State and the community in creating and using social resources? What is the current trend of movement and change of social resources in the Va Temple festival?

3.2. Research hypothesis

To answer the three research questions above, the thesis puts forward the following three hypotheses:

Hypothesis 1: Social values ​​have been formed, expressed and brought benefits through the process of the State managing beliefs and consolidating political ideology. The spread of social values ​​of the image of Duc Thanh Tan is both a personal movement but mostly due to the impact of political factors when selecting values ​​that are suitable for national interests and then disseminating them throughout community life. From there, the State can legitimize its organizational role, expand social relations, carry out the process of "creating traditions" as well as ensuring a good division of social labor.

Second hypothesis: Social capital is formed, expressed and benefits from the community in three aspects: economic, cultural and symbolic. In terms of economy, the agricultural economy of the Doai region has formed beliefs and festivals and the process of localizing Duc Thanh Tan has created the premise for localizing typical products. In terms of culture, the process of forming beliefs, sanctifying worshiped figures, preserving religious beliefs, "creating traditions" as well as psychology and community awareness show clear manifestations of social capital from a community perspective. In addition, the symbol of Duc Thanh Tan and its expressive rituals have regulated behavior and played a profound role in uniting the community.

Comment


Agree Privacy Policy *