Who was considered the “foreign other” during the Vietnam War? The act of othering a particular group has long been a signifier or marker of foreign identity or a clash of upheld ideals and standards. From the perspective of American soldiers in the Vietnam War, the “other” is not just the racial military enemy, but also the Americans back at home. Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried accounts a series of fictional and real events of American soldiers serving the Vietnam War, thereby reflecting the racial othering of the Vietnamese enemy and the foreign othering of the civilians physically disconnected from the warfront. The U.S. troops portrayed in the novel have a difficult time sympathizing with the “others” and are only able to sympathize
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First and foremost, alienation stems from a lack of sympathy or sense of estrangement from particular social groups due to differences in experiences, standards, or moral beliefs. Of the various forms of alienation, including alienation due to different experiences and alienation due to different standards, the more blatant form of estrangement or indifference in O’Brien’s The Things They Carried originates from racial and military tensions. Because the United States stands firm in the annihilation of communism and the communist North Vietnam, indifference to, and therefore alienation from the Northern Vietnamese is plausible. The substantial target for the Viet Cong and those associated with the communist north are the Americans and their attempts to intervene the significant civil war. And similarly, the enemy, from the militaristic and racial perspective, are those associated with the northern region of Vietnam. These differences in ideals, standards, and moral beliefs are what drive the opposing sides to alienate one another. However, because O’Brien focuses on the accounts or perspectives of the United States, only the alienation of the Vietnamese through the lens of American soldiers will be explained from here on …show more content…
The old lifeless Vietnamese man had an arm blown off during combat, and his face and body were progressively decaying. In contrast to expectations, rather than walking past the corpse, “Dave Jensen went over and shook the old man’s hand… ‘Be polite now. Go introduce yourself. Nothing to be afraid about, just a nice old man. Show a little respect for your elders’” (214). Jensen’s action of interacting with the corpse symbolizes racial othering of the Northern Vietnamese due to differences in standards and moral beliefs, especially about communism. Because Ho Chi Minh, the president of North Vietnam at the time, held onto strong pro-nationalist principles and a firm belief in the spread of communism, Americans naturally became indifferent due to a firm belief in a working democratic government, where citizens are the primary deciders in politics. The clashing principles of government rule are ultimately the cause of the civil war and for United States involvement. By shaking the hand and introducing himself to the decaying man, Jensen represents the American soldiers’ loss of sympathy for the racial other and in turn, the strengthened camaraderie between members of the U.S. force through the ability to only sympathize to one’s kind. Rather than owning up the violence and cruelty of warfare that has taken the lives of innocent Vietnamese civilians,
First and foremost, alienation stems from a lack of sympathy or sense of estrangement from particular social groups due to differences in experiences, standards, or moral beliefs. Of the various forms of alienation, including alienation due to different experiences and alienation due to different standards, the more blatant form of estrangement or indifference in O’Brien’s The Things They Carried originates from racial and military tensions. Because the United States stands firm in the annihilation of communism and the communist North Vietnam, indifference to, and therefore alienation from the Northern Vietnamese is plausible. The substantial target for the Viet Cong and those associated with the communist north are the Americans and their attempts to intervene the significant civil war. And similarly, the enemy, from the militaristic and racial perspective, are those associated with the northern region of Vietnam. These differences in ideals, standards, and moral beliefs are what drive the opposing sides to alienate one another. However, because O’Brien focuses on the accounts or perspectives of the United States, only the alienation of the Vietnamese through the lens of American soldiers will be explained from here on …show more content…
The old lifeless Vietnamese man had an arm blown off during combat, and his face and body were progressively decaying. In contrast to expectations, rather than walking past the corpse, “Dave Jensen went over and shook the old man’s hand… ‘Be polite now. Go introduce yourself. Nothing to be afraid about, just a nice old man. Show a little respect for your elders’” (214). Jensen’s action of interacting with the corpse symbolizes racial othering of the Northern Vietnamese due to differences in standards and moral beliefs, especially about communism. Because Ho Chi Minh, the president of North Vietnam at the time, held onto strong pro-nationalist principles and a firm belief in the spread of communism, Americans naturally became indifferent due to a firm belief in a working democratic government, where citizens are the primary deciders in politics. The clashing principles of government rule are ultimately the cause of the civil war and for United States involvement. By shaking the hand and introducing himself to the decaying man, Jensen represents the American soldiers’ loss of sympathy for the racial other and in turn, the strengthened camaraderie between members of the U.S. force through the ability to only sympathize to one’s kind. Rather than owning up the violence and cruelty of warfare that has taken the lives of innocent Vietnamese civilians,