The Mong Oral Tradition: Cultural Memory in the Absence of Written Language (review)

Yer Thao's work offers a unique opportunity for oral historians to engage in the ideas of an academic raised in the oral tradition. Thao's journey from the oral tradition to a doctorate in education in the Western tradition is an extraordinary accomplishment. Thao argues that a successful American educational system must respect and include oral tradition learning to effectively serve our multicultural students. His case study is his own people, the Mong refugees from Laos. One of his central research tools is oral history.

Thao's mission comes out of his childhood experiences and his respect for his complex oral culture. He recalls feeling lost and confused as a twelve-year-old student struggling to learn English and adjust to a literate system complicated by minority status and prejudice. He is Green Mong among a majority of White Hmong refugees with dialect and spelling differences. His mountain tribal people fought a guerilla war with the Central Intelligence Agency against communist incursions in Laos. Following the U.S. withdrawal from Southeast Asia in 1975, the Pathet Lao took over Laos and targeted the Mong/Hmong for reeducation or extermination. Arriving in the U.S. along with Vietnamese and Cambodian refugees, the Mong/Hmong were denigrated for their nonliterate culture.

Although memorization and storytelling have always been a part of the U.S. educational curriculum, Thao's argument for learning in the oral tradition still requires a leap of understanding for Westerners. First is recognizing the complexity and discipline of oral knowledge. Second is the belief that cultural knowledge is sacred and must be kept in the memories of the bodies of people. Many Mong elders argue that writing down spiritual knowledge is a form of forgetting (3). The belief that knowledge collected and archived outside the body is a form of forgetting creates a theoretical challenge for oral historians. When is our work of recorded research an act of precious preservation of cultural knowledge, and when is it an inappropriate undermining of cultural practices?

Thao proposes that oral knowledge and literacy should be complementary approaches to learning. He identifies oral history as a prime example because it integrates oral and written methods of learning. He uses oral histories to explore Mong oral learning experiences. Then he transcribes and writes about those experiences in what he calls "narrative interpretations."

Thao's interviews contribute to oral history in several ways. The elders provide important links in the history of an oral culture. They heard their grandparents' nineteenth-century migration stories from China into Southeast Asia firsthand. Thao brings his competency in English and his fluency as a native Mong speaker to the research. Traditional trust building suggests several visits to narrators before starting the formal interviews. Also, the oral histories illustrate the depth of knowledge and discipline in an oral culture, explore the adjustment challenges of refugees, and teach us cultural values needed in our society. Those values include strong relationships within the family and the community, collective problem solving, respect for the spiritual dimensions of nature, preservation of historical wisdom, and the practice of the sacred tradition of harmony.

Thao organizes the oral histories in two ways. He uses excerpts in Chapters 2-5 to illuminate educational theory and Mong culture. In Chapter 6, thirteen male and female elders' life narratives explore Mong traditional life, the process of transmitting knowledge in an oral culture, the struggles to preserve traditional culture while adjusting to American life, and the resulting strains and conflicts between the generations.

A few examples illustrate this rich material. Every life narrative reveals the values of hard work and cooperation. For example, Elder Chai Xiong describes the communal effort to clear a field: "The Mong have only axes and long knives to cut down the trees. When we cleared the forest, it took us months" (27). The Mong Sersai funeral songs reveal social wisdom and the...