Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Converting Gendered Expectations: Emerging Feminist Discourse Among Protestant And Seventh-Day Adventist Hmong, Stephanie Parsons, Dr. Jacob Hickman

Journal of Undergraduate Research

During my second week living in a Hmong village outside of Chiang Mai, I sat down with a middle-aged woman while she was working on her embroidery. She is a Protestant Christian who has been married twice, once to an old culture Hmong man, and currently to a Thai Buddhist. I was surprised to hear that she didn’t follow the Hmong traditional expectation of converting to either of her husband’s belief systems. When I asked her why she never relinquished her faith in Christianity, she said that she was afraid to follow her first husband in old culture traditions. Her …