Commentary: Gender-based Violence among the (H)mong

• Main Author: Jacques Lemoine
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Hmong Studies Journal 2012-01-01
• Series: Hmong Studies Journal
• Subjects: tribal culture; clan system; gender inequality; bride-price; pride and shame; Chinese patterns.
• Online Access: http://hmongstudies.org/LemoineHSJ13.pdf

Prepared for the Seminar on Cultural Factors in the Prevention and Promotion of Gender-Based Violence held at UNESCO Bangkok on 17-18 May 2012, this article presents the current state of the subject in the patrilineal, patrilocal and patriarchal (H)mong society.After delineating carefully (H)mong GBV through rape, marriage customs, domestic verbal and physical abuses and, in some cases, murder, the author investigates the roots of GBV in different directions: gender asymmetry and inequality; tribal culture and the clan system; the function of the bride price; women’s social mobility in the U.S. and values clashes with American values. After a thorough anthropological analysis, the author concludes that GBV has nothing to do with the clan system, the backbone of the tribal society, but rather involves a long-lasting borrowing of Chinese patterns from the (H)mong past in Imperial China, which could be amended. Gender inequality will hopefully regress if shame, a powerful means ofsocial control among the (H)mong, is used to deter GBV.