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Preface
- Texas Tech University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
|| xiii Preface H MONG refugees started to arrive in the United States from the “secret war” in Laos not long after the Vietnam War ended in 1975. In 1978 I started working in Hmong refugee resettlement at Lao Family Community (LFC) in Santa Ana, California. At that time there was almost a complete lack of information about the Hmong from Laos. I wanted to know more about the history of the people I was working with, so I started taping oral history interviews with my Hmong coworkers. In those early interviews, I sometimes heard guarded mention of a man with the unlikely name of “Mr. Hog.” This “Hog” fellow was an American who supposedly worked for the Central Intelligence Agency and had stuck by the Hmong through the difficult war years. I was skeptical about this story. Then I heard he was working with the Hmong who were in refugee camps in Thailand, and I learned his real name was Jerry Daniels. In 1982 I was still at LFC when the Hmong world around me was badly jolted by the news of the untimely death of Mr. Hog. Hmong leaders headed to Montana to attend his funeral; later I heard it was a three-day traditional Hmong ceremony. The unusual circumstances of a traditional Hmong funeral ceremony being organized and implemented to honor an American CIA case officer was something I didn’t forget. My oral history interviews with Hmong coworkers continued and then expanded to include the Hmong community at large. Over time I heard more about Jerry “Hog” Daniels, but it was 1997 before I took serious action and started to focus on recording oral histories that eventually would capture both the process of the traditional Hmong funeral ceremony and the layers of events and emotions surrounding the life and death of Daniels. This Preface includes a brief look at some of the methodological , cultural, and historical considerations that went into my research and writing. Good oral history research is a slow process, time- and labor-intensive. For ten years I steadily uncovered a network of people who knew Jerry “Hog” Daniels. In addition to the Hmong, there were family members, coworkers, and a multitude of good friends who spanned continents and decades. In the end I audiotaped and transcribed interviews with almost 100 of these folks, more than 80 percent of whom had attended either the memorial service for Daniels in Bangkok or his funeral in Montana. Those interviewed were roughly 70 percent American, 30 percent Hmong (born in Laos and now living in the United States), along with three Thai nationals. My objective was to document in detail their firsthand experiences of Daniels as told in each person’s unique voice. Initial interviews provided the foundation of individual accounts; subsequent interviews (multiple meetings with each person) allowed participants time to reflect between interviews and gave me the opportunity to probe for deeper memories and speculations. Eventually I intertwined narrative pieces xiv || Preface pulled from individual memoirs to produce a dynamic picture of the simple life pleasures that Daniels relished as well as the reality of responsibilities of the life he led. In order to create an accurate sense of the traditional Hmong funeral ceremony, I spent more than a year attending many Hmong funerals and interviewing numerous experienced and knowledgeable Hmong funeral practitioners. This exposure produced a composite text that is narrated by a single unnamed voice. The Hmong funeral as described in this book is consistent with most Hmong family/clan spirit beliefs [peb cov dab quas]. The details of how the ceremony was modified for the funeral for Jerry Daniels came from his Hmong funeral organizers. Because this work is oral history, I have chosen not to use [sic] to mark where an error appears in an interview or letter; I feel that is unnecessary. However, a brief review of my choices regarding Hmong name order, Southeast Asian place names, and Hmong language will assist the reader’s entry into the world of Hog’s Exit. Those who are not familiar with Hmong name order should be alerted that while most of the Hmong personal names are westernized (given name first followed by family/ clan name), traditional Hmong name order is family/clan name first followed by given name. In Hog’s Exit a person may be referred to either way. For example, Cha Moua uses the westernized name order (Cha Moua) when referring to himself; others who refer to him often use the...