Dreaming of Money in Ho Chi Minh City

Title Page, Copyright Page

Critical Dialogues in Southeast Asian Studies Charles Keyes, Vicente Rafael, and Laurie J. Sears, Series Editors Critical Dialogues in Southeast Asian Studies This series offers perspectives in Southeast Asian Studies that stem from reconsideration of the relationships among scholars, texts, archives, field sites, and subject matter. Volumes in the series feature inquiries into historiography, critical ethnography, colonialism and postcolonialism, nationalism and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, science and technology, politics and society, and literature, drama, and film. A common vision of the series is a belief that area studies scholarship sheds light on shifting contexts and contests over forms of knowing and modes of action that inform cultural politics and shape histories of modernity. Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communism: Ton Duc Thang and the Politics of History and Memory by Christoph Giebel Beginning to Remember: The Past in the Indonesian Present edited by Mary S. Zurbuchen Seditious Histories: Contesting Thai and Southeast Asian Pasts by Craig J. Reynolds Knowing Southeast Asian Subjects edited by Laurie J. Sears Making Fields of Merit: Buddhist Female Ascetics and Gendered Orders in Thailand by Monica Lindberg Falk Love, Passion and Patriotism: Sexuality and the Philippine Propaganda Movement, 1882–1892 by Raquel A. G. Reyes Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words: Intertextuality and Buddhist Monastic Education in Laos and Thailand by Justin Thomas McDaniel The Ironies of Freedom: Sex, Culture, and Neoliberal Governance in Vietnam by Thu-hu’o’ng Nguyễn-võ Submitting to God: Women and Islam in Urban Malaysia by Sylva Frisk No Concessions: The Life of Yap Thiam Hien, Indonesian Human Rights Lawyer by Daniel S. Lev The Buddha on Mecca’s Verandah: Encounters, Mobilities, and Histories along the Malaysian-Thai Border by Irving Chan Johnson Dreaming of Money in Ho Chi Minh City by Allison Truitt Dreaming of Money in Ho Chi Minh City Allison Truitt University of Washington Press Seattle and London This book is published with the assistance of a grant from the Charles and Jane Keyes Endowment for Books on Southeast Asia, established through the generosity of Charles and Jane Keyes. This book is also supported by the Association for Asian Studies First Book Subvention Program and by the Dean’s Office of the School of Liberal Arts at Tulane University.© 2013 by the University of Washington Press Printed and bound in the United States of America Design by Thomas Eykemans Composed in Minion, typeface designed by Robert Slimbach 17 16 15 14 13 5 4 3 2 1 All photographs are by the author. Parts of chapter 5 were previously published as “Big Money, New Money, and ATMs: Valuing Vietnamese Currency in Ho Chi Minh City,” in Research in Economic Anthropology 24 (2006): 283–308, and were later expanded upon and published as “Banking on the Middle Class,” in The Reinvention of Distinction, ed. Van Nguyen-Marshall, Lisa B. Welch Drummond, and Daniele Belanger (New York: Springer, 2011), 129–41. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. University of Washington Press PO Box 50096, Seattle, WA 98145, USA www.washington.edu/uwpress Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Truitt, Allison, author. Dreaming of money in Ho Chi Minh City / Allison Truitt. pages cm. — (Critical dialogues in Southeast Asian studies) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-295-99275-4 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-295-99274-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Money—Social aspects—Vietnam. 2. Consumer behavior—Social aspects—Vietnam. 3. Monetary policy—Vietnam. I. Title. HG1250.5.T78 2013 306.309597'7—dc23 2013005720 The paper used in this publication is acid-free and meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1984.∞ For Quang, Kim Nhat, and Quang Minh. Tiền! Tiền là tiên là Phật, Tiền là sức bật lò xo, Tiền là thước đo lòng người, Tiền lànụ cười tuổi trẻ, Tiền là sức khỏe tuổi già. —Thơ châm biếm Money! Money, a fairy, a god, Money, the force of a coiled spring, Money, the measure of a person’s...