To Be and Not to Be: Hmong-American Culture Quiz

Answer: A copious body of written literature

The Hmong language does not have a native orthography (writing system), and is usually expressed in written form by a derivation of the Latin alphabet published by French missionary F. M. Savina in 1924. The Hmong refusal to assimilate is legendary, and has been a bone of contention both under imperial China and in the modern United States.

In Asia, the Hmong are usually classified as "montegards" - mountain people. In fact, Hmong scholar Keith Quincy has remarked that some of the Hmong's Southeast Asian territory would be considered habitable only by the Hmong or mountain goats. Finally, the distinct Hmong ethnic characteristics and folklore have led many scholars to speculate that they migrated from Siberia.

Answer: Shamanism

According to Hmong mythology, the shamans' art dates from the time of Shee Yee, a hero not unlike the Greek Prometheus or the Germanic Siegfried. Shee Yee discovered the secrets of healing the sick by observing the arts of dragons. He set out to heal all humanity with these secrets, but was opposed by the misanthropic Ndu Nyong, a god of sickness and death who liked to eat humans. Both Shee Yee and Ndu Nyong were greatly weakened from these campaigns, resulting in Shee Yee's casting down his weakened shamanic tools for people to use against Ndu Nyong's remaining army of malevolent spirits, the "dab". (There are benevolent "dab" as well, including the "dab neeb" that assist current-day shamans in their healing labors.)

There is a great deal of lay shamanism in Hmong culture as well, including using oracles like animal sacrifice to predict the future.

Answer: True

Opinions vary on how many souls a person has; some say three, some say seven, and so on down the line. What is generally agreed is that illness results when one of these souls is separated from the body. The shaman's role, in part, is to bring the soul and person back together, as well as to do something about the dab who caused the problem. It should be noticed that Hmong shamans are not rigidly dogmatic about the spiritual nature of illness, and do acknowledge that sometimes there is no dab involved, or that occasionally a problem is organic rather than spiritual - though more often than not sickness is seen to have a spiritual component.

When a Hmong person dies, one soul is reincarnated, and another stays with the body. Both souls are ministered to in a Hmong funeral. The one to be reincarnated is supported and prayed for so it will have a good journey, while the soul that stayed with the body is appeased with offerings of food and alcohol - as well as the washing of the deceased's bones - so it would not return to harm the living.

Answer: An umbrella used in marriage ceremonies

Literally meaning "spirit of life", shamans often refer to their helpers as "dab neeg". Non-shamans also believe that they are surrounded by spirits that can help or hinder their lives, and often use the same term for these; this is similar to the Russian "domovoi", whose relationship with the household can also be a double-edged sword. Collectors of Hmong lore have further used the term for folklore, and the best work (in English) on Hmong folklore is "Dab Neeg Hmoob" by Charles Johnson.

The umbrella used in marriage ceremonies is called the "lub kaus"; its symbolic role is to protect the couple at the beginning of their life together.

Answer: Qeeg

The qeeg is an interesting assemblage from a North Atlantic point of view. It consists of several bamboo cylinders lashed together, with holes down the side for fingering different notes, thus allowing for various chords. Perhaps its closest analog in European culture is the Pan flute, though the three-foot-plus qeeg (also transliterated as "k'eng" or "khaene") dwarfs Zamfir's vaunted instrument, and the reeds are not blown from above but from the side via a shorter pipe roughly perpendicular to the others.

The qeeg is essential at funerals, where its music guides the soul of the deceased to the land of its ancestors. On a more upbeat note, the qeeg is also featured at New Year festivals and practically every social situation where there is music.

In times past, the qeeg was also used for distance communication in a manner similar to the "talking drum" of many African cultures; the notes of the qeeg imitate the intonation of the voice, conveying the gist if not the letter of the message.

Answer: True

If a village only has people from one clan, a Hmong adolescent male will usually travel to another village to find a bride; for this reason, the Hmong prefer to congregate in larger villages with many clans represented. This motivation also partially explains why Hmong émigrés to the United States have chosen to settle in just a few areas as opposed to fanning all over the country.

Answer: False

Though wives do become part of their husbands' households (and polygamy is condoned, albeit not the norm), they maintain relations with their new clan, even keeping their maiden names. Other Hmong courtship and marriage traditions include the prohibition on courting a young lady in her home (a young man will usually try various tactics to coax her out for a "date") and the divisive practice of "bride capture".

These abductions are often consensual on the brides' part; young women are typically "stolen" when they want to marry but their parents object; by putting up token opposition, they save face with their families. "Bride-price", where the groom's family pays the bride's family, is also common with the Hmong.

The element of exchange is usually de-emphasized; the important part is the solemnization of the union through this exchange, as well as the opportunity to "clear the air" between families for past conflicts and make indemnity by negotiating bride price.

Answer: Tie-dying

Pa ndau designs range from the highly stylized and symbolic (snail designs representing family growth and connectedness, elephants' feet representing prosperity, fish hooks standing for young women seeking husbands) to overt storycloths depicting the flight from Laos. More recent storycloths commemorate more American motifs, including Christian and holiday designs - even dinosaurs! These distinctive textiles are traditionally honored gifts between families, and are particularly evident in marriages, funerals, and the birth of children. In the twenty-first century, they are among the more popular and profitable Hmong cottage industries.

If somebody out there has a Hmong tie-die, I want to see it, by gum!

Answer: The Hmong have settled in tightly-knit enclaves in a few U.S. areas, despite government efforts to disperse them throughout the country

Though U.S. government policy was indeed to settle the refugee Hmong throughout the country so as to not unduly impact any one area's social services, the Hmong themselves have other ideas, and have since clustered in Northern California and the Great Lakes states of Minnesota and Wisconsin; many native-born residents of communities like Merced, CA and Wausau, WI have described the situation as overwhelming by American standards. The decades since their original arrival have worn away at the insularity of these ethnic strongholds (hence the subtitle of this quiz), but the Hmong remain very distinct from their neighbors. For the record, Hmong émigrés have had prolific offspring, and American-born Hmong now outnumber the refugee generation.

In fairness, this phenomenon is hardly new in the United States. My own grandfather was born in a Swedish community in central Nebraska. Because of the conditions in his family and the ethnic community in which they lived, neither my grandfather nor his sister conversed in English until they started school.

Answer: Difficulties in immigration due to the "War on Terror"

As many Hmong - particularly younger, American-born people - have converted to Christianity, older generations fear that the proper shamanistic rites for sickness and guiding the soul to the afterlife will not be performed for them, leading to a great deal of conflict and a backlash against assimilation. It is worth mentioning that many Hmong Christians retain some shamanistic forms in their personal lives. One woman I know, for example, sings the spirit song to her small children at the beginning and end of a long drive. In Hmong tradition, this song helps guide the baby's soul back to the body if it gets lost during the trip. The lyrics (which I will NOT attempt to coherently translate here) aren't contrary to the Christian message, so she keeps singing them.

Though Hmong dependence on social services has decreased substantially since the immigration waves of the 1970s and early 1980s, the Hmong in America are still disproportionately dependent on the government, a dynamic that is utterly at odds with their iconoclastically independent history. This dependence is exacerbated by the simple realization that, in order to earn an independent living in the U.S., a Hmong person must make vast concessions to American culture; some Hmong have been able to sustain themselves partially on small-scale agriculture and cottage industry, but for the vast majority material independence comes at the cost of accepting the majority culture, language, and education.

Changes in gender roles have, predictably, been a culture shock to this thoroughly patriarchal society, particularly when young, college-educated Hmong women find themselves earning more money than their fathers or grandfathers, a reversal that is very hard for traditional Hmong to take. Since the Hmong came to the U.S. after fighting on behalf of the CIA in Laos, and since Hmong immigration has mostly dwindled since the early 1980s, immigration crackdowns after 9/11 has not been a major issue in the Hmong community.

Thank you for taking this quiz! If you have any questions or comments, especially regarding its accuracy, please let me know. Hmong history is not my strongest area, and I am always looking to improve.