Making tradition charismatic: Music, memory and alliance in contemporary southern Vietnam.

Abstract

In this dissertation, I examine how charismatic musicians in southern Vietnam create and preserve a genre of traditional music called <italic>nhac tai tu Nam bo</italic>, or the music of talented amateurs. These musicians deploy their creativity largely outside the purview of the state and established institutions to produce a sustainable traditional music. I investigate the lives and projects of Teacher of Merit [<italic>Nha giao uu tu</italic>] Pham Thuy Hoan, who directs the Sounds of the Homeland Ensemble, advocates accessibility in her production of music and performs more effective national music; Revered musician [<italic>Nghe nhan</italic>] Tran Minh Duc, who has a broader conceptualization of the <italic>tai tu</italic> repertory and advocates that the inclusion of Chinese, Khmer and French music strengthens practitioners' ties to the multi-ethnic identity of the region; and Master musician [<italic> Nhac su</italic>] Nguyen Vinh Sao, who creates complex improvisations of a small number of core <italic>tai tu</italic> compositions that he records and disseminates via e-mail his Vietnamese followers living in diaspora. Through an examination of the pedagogical methods and performances of these musicians, I propose a theory of the charismatic musician. Charisma emerges when an individual first realizes that a problem exists that requires a new approach, new methods and new solutions. Prospective followers then encounter these practices and recognize the worth of the methods of the individual. Through consistent interaction and lessons with the charismatic individual, followers acquire reproducible knowledge. As followers begin to reorganize their approaches to theory and practice and the charismatic encourages the followers to change their conceptions of risk, taboo and difference, their beliefs begin to change. These revised beliefs are not temporary, but permanent and stable enough to withstand ideological attacks and persuasion. As a result of these shifts, followers begin view themselves as part of dynamic and stable communities. The charismatic then begins to routinize charisma in order to preserve the results of interacting with the charismatic and the process leading towards the production of new communities of identity expression. Charismatics therefore enable the transformation of both traditional music and constructs of identity beyond their local environments.