Designing Interactive Zones for Preservation & Engagement – Zone 8: Global Dialogue -Encountering the World of Mother Goddess Worship

1. Objective

• To introduce international visitors to Đạo Mẫu (Mother Goddess Worship) and hầu đồng (spirit mediumship) as a living Vietnamese spiritual-artistic tradition.
• To create an immersive intercultural space where audiences can explore how art, ritual, and belief intertwine in Vietnamese culture.
• To foster cultural diplomacy through dialogue-positioning hầu đồng as a vibrant form of heritage that bridges local devotion with global understanding.

2. Content & Activities

a. Immersive Introduction Film (5–7 minutes)

• Visitors begin their journey with a short film capturing scenes from the “Mother Goddess: Pure Heart – Beauty – Joy” exhibition at the Vietnamese Women’s Museum.
• Narration (with English, French, and Japanese subtitles) introduces the theology of Mother Goddess worship , its pantheon of deities, and the artistry of hầu đồng rituals where music, costume, and performance merge to honor the divine.
• The film highlights the UNESCO recognition (2016) of the tradition as an Intangible Cultural Heritage, emphasizing its role in identity, healing, and intergenerational continuity.

b. Cross-Cultural Encounter Pathway (Field Trip Module)

Location: Vietnamese Women’s Museum, Hà Nội

Visitors walk through a curated pathway replicating the museum’s exhibition layout, featuring life-sized mannequins dressed in embroidered ritual costumes, jewelry, musical instruments, and altar reconstructions.

Audio guides offer stories of practitioners: mediums explaining how each headdress style, robe, fan, or weapon connects to specific deities and spiritual symbolism.

Subtle incense scents, chầu văn melodies, and ambient lighting evoke the ritual atmosphere, allowing visitors to experience the sensory world of hầu đồng.

c. Live Dialogue Booths – “From Hà Nội to the World”

• Small-group conversations between Vietnamese mediums, artisans, and foreign visitors (with interpreters).
• Participants can handle ritual objects, learn about symbolic gestures, or try simple chầu văn rhythms using traditional instruments.
• These exchanges transform observation into cultural connection, replacing “museum distance” with lived dialogue.

d. Global Reflection Wall

• After the visit, participants write or record short reflections answering prompts such as:

“What emotion or symbol resonated most with you during the ritual?”

“What does the Mother Goddess tradition reveal about universal spirituality?”

• Messages are added to a growing physical and digital archive, displayed in rotating international exhibitions to promote intercultural understanding.

3. Outcomes

• Cultural Awareness: Global audiences gain a nuanced understanding of hầu đồng, not as exotic spectacle, but as an artistic and spiritual system rooted in community values.
• Embodied Engagement: Through film, scent, sound, and dialogue, visitors experience Vietnamese intangible heritage as living, sensory, and evolving.
• Cultural Diplomacy: The zone strengthens Vietnam’s global cultural image, showcasing its creative approach to safeguarding spiritual traditions.
• Living Archive: Collected reflections form an ongoing repository of international perspectives, informing future exhibitions, conferences, and cultural collaborations.

REFLECTION WALL

1. “Threads of the Divine” by Aiko (Japan)

I came here expecting to study another country’s ritual, but instead, I felt like I was meeting my own ancestors in a different language.

When the film showed the medium twirling a red scarf, I immediately thought of the kagurad ances from my hometown shrine – the way the movements summon calm and joy at once. I realized that whether we call her Amaterasu or Liễu Hạnh, the Mother Goddess carries the same grace: she dances to remind us that light can be human.

2. “The Music That Spoke Without Words” by Rafael (Brazil)

The first drumbeat of chầu văn felt strangely familiar  like the atabaque drums in Candomblé rituals I grew up hearing in Bahia. Both traditions sing to call the divine through rhythm and surrender. When I joined the dialogue booth and tried tapping the wooden fish drum, a Vietnamese artist smiled and said, “It’s not just rhythm; it’s invitation.” In that moment, I understood: our gods, though oceans apart, respond to the same heartbeat.

3. “Faith as Art, Art as Faith” by Elise (France)

As an art historian, I came to admire the embroidery, the silk, the precision of gesture. But after listening to the medium’s voice in the booth, something shifted. Her story  of pain, loss, and transformation through ritual  turned beauty into something deeper. I realized that in Đạo Mẫu, aesthetics are not decoration; they are devotion. Every shimmering thread, every movement of a fan, is an act of faith made visible. I left with the sense that art, at its purest, has always been a way to heal what cannot be spoken.

4. “Between Worlds, We Meet” by Michael (United States)

I’m not a religious person. I work in cultural diplomacy, so I often observe rituals as “heritage,” not belief. But standing before the altar reconstruction, surrounded by soft incense and that haunting voice singing chầu văn, I felt an unexpected quiet inside me. The line between performance and prayer dissolved. During the group discussion, a Vietnamese medium told me: “Spirit doesn’t need to convince you, only to meet you.”

5. “Continuum of the Unseen” by Leila (Morocco)

At the world map display, I tapped my country and saw images of gnawa ceremonies, our own dances of trance and healing. It struck me that though the costumes, chants, and colors differ, the purpose is the same: to speak with what cannot be seen, to release what the heart holds too tightly. When I watched the Vietnamese medium lift her