This article investigates the representation of gender and sexuality, the relationship between gender and modernity and notions of the feminine in contemporary Vietnamese literature. The liberalized political atmosphere of the đổi mới period in Vietnam ushered in a new wave of creativity imbued with a strong critical charge and unleashed a process of social, cultural and political renegotiation. It necessitated and made possible a reconfiguration of fundamental social categories including those of gender, sexuality and female morality. As issues of gender and sexuality became an increasingly important focus in contemporary Vietnam, there emerged a new literary discourse interrogating women’s changing identities and agencies and celebrating female sexuality and subjectivity. A significant contribution of this literature of renovation lies in its engagement with the gendered exploration of the legacy of war and its tragic ramifications for female identity; such works enriched the representation of the conflict by highlighting the discrepancy between the wartime empowerment of women and their post-war disempowerment. Meanwhile, renovation also bolstered the consideration of female equality in terms of sexuality and individualism. The younger generation of writers is dismantling traditional female stereotypes of filial daughters, virtuous wives and caring mothers and renders a multifaceted portrayal of the new woman who personifies the break with conservative modes of womanhood. For contemporary writers the new woman becomes a powerful symbol of social change as she pursues her own ideals of womanhood, sexuality and modernity.
The article aims to summarize the main moments of the modernization process of Vietnamese literature, which was triggered by the penetration of the French into Vietnam in the second half of the 19th century. It was the press and magazines that played a major part in the transformation of Vietnamese literature as well as translations of Western and Chinese literature that inspired Vietnamese writers in their creative endeavors. The modernization movement culminated in 1925, when first two modern Vietnamese novels were published and Vietnamese literature found its own voice., Mária Strašáková., and Obsahuje poznámky a seznam literatury