I think I’ve read more books for pleasure this year than I have over the four years of college combined. Fortunately, there’s enough good literature on the region that I’ve also been able to spend a lot of that reading time learning about Cambodia and the region at large. In addition, a few classics that have been on my list for a while have made the cut. Plus, there’s the occasional break for when I need to escape from the context of Southeast Asia and don’t feel like reading an old book.
On the recommendation of Elena and some of the rest of the Lao crew, I just started Anne Fadiman’s The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, which chronicles the life of an immigrant Hmong family’s epileptic daughter and, in the process, talks a lot about the edges of where cultures meet and some of the misunderstandings that result.
The best part about reading these relevant-to-the-region books is that I can usually either relate to the stories in some way or gain a greater understanding about where I am this year.
So far, no other book has as well expressed the occasional anger that can result unintentionally between people from two different cultures looking at the same issue with such little common ground as Spirit has. In talking about the conflict between Lia’s parents, who are accustomed to Hmong medicine and believe that the American doctors are actually hurting their daughter, and the doctors, who are brought to absolute frustration over the fact that Lia’s parents are failing to follow their medical directions and are therefore jeopardizing the health and even life of their child. The interactions between these sets of people so illustrates the anger, not even just frustration, that can result when core beliefs are put in opposition, even though the book looks at it objectively enough to be able to realize that both sides are right and wrong in their own ways.
Additionally, though not at as intense in scale or as important in context, I can relate to the weird feeling discussed in the book of simply not being able to translate an idea between one culture and another. The language translation doesn’t exist, but the idea’s almost indescribable as well. As taken from the book, how does one differentiate what a psychologist is from other doctors when Hmong believe that all sicknesses, including even a common cold, involve spirits and something gone amiss with one’s spirit and head.
And finally, in reading about a female researcher working within a traditional Hmong community, it’s hard to avoid thinking about when one is acting more admirably by conforming to local social norms, such as by showing higher respect to males than females purely because of their gender, and when one should be unbending about beliefs that one holds to be truly virtuous, such as treating all people equally.