Built in 1987, The Vietnam Museum of Ethnology showcases the culture of the 54 ethnic minorities living in Vietnam, plus some inevitable exhibits on Kinh culture of the past. The museum has three main areas. The primary building shows the traditional costumes, instruments, language, crafts, and rituals of the various ethnicities. The secondary building expands beyond Vietnam to show the roots and presence of the various ethnicities elsewhere in Southeast Asia, and the connections between them. The third area, and definitely the most interesting of them, is the outdoor garden, featuring full-scale dwellings built by various tribes as they would have done in their villages.
The 54 ethnic minorities of Vietnam are an intriguing subject. Composing roughly 9% of the population and divided into dozens of subgroups, photographers and anthropologists have spent decades motorcycling the country, finding, meeting, living with and studying them.
Making up 88% of the population, Viet or Kinh people arrived in the red river delta from Southern China between four and five thousand years ago. Some of the ethnic minorities were already present in the area, but many were not. Over around 1000 years, the Kinh conquered or absorbed indigenous groups until they became the overwhelmingly dominant culture, moving ever further south. In Vietnamese creation myth, this history is described thus: The Dragon King of the South married Au Co, a beautiful northern princess, and she gave birth to 100 strong princes. However, missing his lowland home, he decided to return there. He left 50 sons in the highlands, where they fathered the tribes, and took the remaining 50 south, where they became the Kinh people.
Members of the highland tribes are distinguishable by physical features, language, dress, and customs, in that order. As an ignorant outsider, even when visiting them in their homes, some groups are more easily distinguishable than others. For example, the difference between Dao and Hmong was obvious to me, but the difference among subgroups- Red v. Black Dao, Black v. Green Hmong etc., needed to be explained to me. Relatively speaking, Westerners have a lot of cultural and linguistic overlap; if you understand one Romance or Nordic language, with a bit of relatively superficial study you can understand a good part of them all. It was wild to me that people living on either side of a single mountain in Northern Vietnam wouldn't understand each other or intermarry for hundreds or thousands of years. The origins and development of the related groups, their diasporas and distinctions, are a rich field of study for ethnographers.
Based on language, there are 8 original peoples, if you will, who over the centuries have subdivided into the 54+ we know today:
1. Mon – Khmer (Ba Na, Brau, Bru Van Kieu, Cho Ro, Co, Co Ho, Co Tu, Gie Trieng, Hre, Khang, Khmer, Kho Mu, Ma, Mang, M’nong, O Du, Ro Mam, Ta Oi, Xinh Mun, Xo Dang, and Xtieng)
2. Tay – Thai (Bo Y, Giay, Lao, Lu, Nung, San Chay, Tay, and Thai)
3. Tibeto – Burman (Cong, Ha Nhi, La Hu, Lo Lo, Phu La, and Si La)
4. Malayo – Polynesian (Cham, Chu Ru, E De, Gia Rai, and Ra Glai)
5. Viet – Muong (Chut, Kinh, Muong, and Tho)
6. Kadai (Co, Lao, La Chi, La Ha, and Pu Peo)
7. Mong – Dao (Dao, H’Mong, and Pa Then)
8. Han (Hoa, Ngai, and San Diu)
At the museum, they are grouped as:
1. Muong, Tho, Chut
2. Tay-Thai Group
3. Kadai Group
4. Hmong-Yao Group
5. Sino-Tibetan Group
6. Northern Mon-Khmer
7. Truong Son Range - Central Highlands Mon-Khmer
8. Austronesian
9. Cham, Hoa, Khmer
According to the museum, what the ethnic minorities have in common is their traditional way of life: most of the groups rely on wet rice agriculture, combined with raising poultry, hunting, and fishing. They also typically practice handicrafts including weaving, forging, pottery, and carpentry for personal consumption and local barter, and only participate in commerce on a limited basis. Most ethnic groups consider the village as the most important social unit; however, village organization, house styles, family, society, and religious traditions are diverse. Spiritual beliefs remain genuine, and rites shape calendars.
The role of the ethnic minorities in recent history, and their degree of assimilation to Viet, American, French, and Chinese culture, politics and religion is left untouched. I was shocked to learn that many Hmong are some degree of Catholic, for example, and had to visit them to learn it; it's not in this museum. Also, the Montagnards rather famously allied with the French during the Indochina wars, in exchange for the promise of an autonomous homeland, but their role in this recent history and in modern Vietnamese politics, where they are well represented in the party congress, is not explored.
As for the museum itself, I think it's a good jumping-off point but rather too superficial. If you're coming in with a total ignorance of the topic, I'd recommend you visit the bookstore first, read up, then hit the museum to match the objects of material culture with the info and photos you've absorbed. In terms of costume, jewelry, shamanistic and cultural objects, you can see much of the same at the history museum and the women's museum. However, the ethnology museum really sets itself apart in the garden.
If you are not going to make it to every mountain village during your trip to Vietnam, you can rest assured that the houses here are full-sized, rather luxurious dwellings built by the ethnic minorities themselves, who were paid dearly to come to Hanoi and do the job. The houses and the objects in them are the real thing, and immense fun, especially for kids.
The bookstore is also excellent, and the gift shop, while expensive, is a Craft Link shop, with excellent quality souvenirs made by the ethnic minorities themselves, and other underprivileged populations, ensuring your money flows back to them, at least in part. The restaurant employs students at a vocational school for underprivileged youth, training them for hospitality jobs, so it's certainly worth patronizing. Lastly, there's an excellent daily water puppet performance. I've been to the famous water puppet theater in Hanoi as well, and this performance is equally wonderful, if not better, because it provides a booklet explaining each of the stories, which are hundreds of years old and well known by all, rather like Punch and Judy shows in the UK.
If you have kids, this museum is a must-see in Hanoi. If you don't, it's not an absolute must, the information can be gleaned elsewhere, but I did truly enjoy it.