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Childbirth, Maternity, and Medical Pluralism in French Colonial Vietnam, 1880–1945 by Thuy Linh Nguyen (review)

Childbirth, Maternity, and Medical Pluralism in French Vietnam, 1880-1945 engages with the prevailing idea that colonies were used as laboratories for French experiments in modernity. Using archives in Vietnam and France, as well as published medical sources and newspaper sources, Thuy Linh Nguyen investigates the example of the French introduction of “modern” medical services in biomedical birthing and scientific childcare in colonial Vietnam. While the colonial administration attempted to replace the local maternity and childcare systems, this new system failed to supplant indigenous childbirth and childcare practices. Nguyen details the process by which the French medical system came to incorporate Vietnamese cultural practices into the maternity and childcare system. She argues that by the late colonial period, a plural maternity and childcare system developed in colonial Vietnam, one that compromised and coexisted with the indigenous cultural practices. The chapters of Childbirth, Maternity, and Medical Pluralism in French Vietnam, 1880-1945 are organized thematically with a loose chronological approach to show the process by which the French biomedical system failed to take root in Vietnam and evolved as a localized system. Chapter 1 introduces readers to Vietnamese birthing practices in the late 19 century, as the French government was establishing colonial rule over Vietnam. These practices included techniques used by traditional midwives called B a mu _ , including maternal diet, herbal medications, avoidance of metal medical instruments during birth, treatment of the placenta after birth, and the “mother roasting” tradition in which new mothers spent at least one month in seclusion in a birthing hut, laying on a bed over a charcoal stove. While 19 century French observers saw these practices as barbaric or unhygienic, Nguyen shows that these practices served the purpose of relieving women’s anxieties about birthing. As Nguyen explains, “mother roasting” helped postpartum women expel blood associated with pregnancy and birthing, blood that was said to attract bad spirits. Nineteenthcentury French observers blamed high rates of infant mortality on what was believed to be unhygienic Vietnamese birthing practices and poorly trained B a mu _ , leading French medical practitioners to demonize B a mu _ . This reasoning became the basis for colonial medical practitioners to impose “modern” French medical practices in Vietnam, the subject of Chapter 2. Nguyen follows the process by