Les (Vietnam)

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Les is a colloquial Vietnamese term of identification for more globally common labels like lesbian, queer woman, or female homosexual. It is derived mainly from scholarship by Vietnamese-American ethnographer Natalie Newton, who is, at present, the only Western scholar to have centred Vietnam's les as her subject of investigation. Her articles have been frequently cited as reference or point of entry to issues concerning Vietnamese queer communities. As a research topic, Vietnamese homosexualities have only recently garnered scholarly interest. A large majority of scholarship has been produced in the 2010s, not allowing much time for significant historical evolution or reinterpretations. Hence, besides Newton and a handful of other academics, scholarship on homosexuality and LGBT issues in Vietnam is limited. Consequently, research on the demographic subset of Vietnam's les is even rarer. However, the relative lack of sources might in fact productively and aptly explain the conditions of life and kinship for Vietnamese les. In fact, scholarly neglect mirrors, and can even be attributed to, the marginalization of les due to the intertwined, compounded discriminations against both women and homosexuality. In her writing, Newton echoes the observation that the lack of direct scholarship on Vietnamese les strongly suggests that their agential forms of self-identification and community formation obliquely eludes homophobic interpellations and institutions. Therefore, instead of focusing on global liberal structures and discourses that similarly attempt to interpellate, define, and identify les, such as gay marriage laws, LGBT rights in Vietnam, or NGO activity, this entry will focus on les personal identifications and kinship structures, and how they differ from definitions imposed on them by governing macro-structures.