On Their Own: Women Journalists and the American Experience in Vietnam

by Joyce Hoffmann

Over three hundred women, both print and broadcast journalists, were accredited to chronicle America's activities in Vietnam. Many of those women won esteemed prizes for their reporting, including the Pulitzer, the Overseas Press Club Award, the George Polk Award, the National Book Award, and the Bancroft Prize for History. Tragically, several lost their lives covering the war, while others were wounded or taken prisoner. In this gripping narrative, veteran journalist Joyce Hoffmann tells the important yet largely unknown story of a central group of these female journalists, including Dickey Chapelle, Gloria Emerson, Kate Webb, and others. Each has a unique and deeply compelling tale to tell, and vivid portraits of their personal lives and professional triumphs are woven into the controversial details of America's twenty-year entanglement in Southeast Asia.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Journalism, War

448 pages, Hardcover

First published June 23, 2008

Reviews

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 1/2 stars, actually. Agree with others that that the detail is a bit overwhelming, even a touch dry in beginning. So much so that I put the book aside after 50+ pgs, and didn't resume it until a few months later. And boy am I glad I did. I've read lots on Vietnam, fiction and nonfiction,and a fair amount on war reporting, in Vietnam and else where (highly recommend The First Casualty), and Hoffmann's book is among the best. The phrase "personal and panoramic," used by another critic reviewing memoir by Beverly Deepe, one of women featured in this book, well describes Hoffmann's approach, and it works very well. I felt like I was reliving this era all over again, all the more vividly for Hoffmann's ability to describe how the work of these women illuminated the larger tragedy. Her account of final days of Saigon is riveting and harrowing. By the end, I was plowing through this book like a suspenseful novel,even though I already knew the ending. Biggest compliment I can give this book is that it has inspired me to look up books written by a number of these women after the war. Though highly sympathetic to struggles of women fighting sexism as well as military censors, Hoffmann does not romanticize them, pointing out their foibles and blindspots,personal and professional, and the criticism of respected colleagues. This book deserves a much wider audience.

[Priscilla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three-and-a-half stars, rounded up. This is probably the most comprehensive look at Western women journalists in Vietnam, covering a broad number of subjects (Gloria Emerson, Martha Gellhorn, Dickie Chappelle, Beverly Deepe, Frances FitzGerald, Edie Lederer, Catherine Leroy, Liz Trotta, Kate Webb, Laura Palmer, and Tad Bartimus, among others) and most importantly including Ethel Payne, the first black reporter to cover combat. It would have been five stars for me if not for two things--one of them quite serious. First, it was riddled with typos. I was reading the Kindle version, so it's possible that these errors were a result of producing the ebook, but they were a real distraction nonetheless. The second, more serious reason I bumped this down was that in several spots, the author makes comments about the Vietnamese language that border on racist. In one spot she refers to "a place with the unlikely name of Trang Bang"--why is that unlikely? If it's unlikely for reasons due to Vietnamese language or culture, these aren't explained, so it just comes off sounding as though she thinks the name is funny (to Western ears, that is). The second one is worse: in discussing the situation in Cambodia, she refers to "the unfortunately named Major Am Rong." This attempt at a joke comes late in the pages of a serious book about the war (and one of the only books to cover the contribution American women journalists made there) and smacks of racism, which I (hopefully) doubt Hoffmann intended, but really, what was she thinking? And why didn't any editor catch it?

This is a strong companion to War Torn: Stories of War from the Women Reporters who Covered Vietnam, which is still my favorite asit provides first-hand accounts of the contributors' experiences, including those of Laura Palmer, Edie Lederer, Kate Webb, and Tad Bartimus. Unfortunately, War Torn was published in 2002, and Payne died in 1991. It would have been incredible to get her perspective. Hoffmann covers her subjects chronologically, so she also provides a clear context regarding the war itself and the political situation playing out in America. She also manages to avoid a lot of trivial and unnecessary details or gossip about her subjects. Despite those two missteps mentioned above, I highly recommend it.

[Elizabeth Dunham]

Of the more than 2,200 journalists who were accredited by the U.S. military to cover Vietnam between 1965 and 1975, only 70 of them were women and most of those went in only for a short time to cover specific stories, such as someone from their town. Tragically, several lost their lives covering the war, while others were wounded or taken prisoner. In this gripping narrative, veteran journalist Joyce Hoffmann tells the important yet largely unknown story of a central group of these female journalists, including Dickey Chapelle, Gloria Emerson, Kate Webb, and others. Each has a unique and deeply compelling tale to tell, and vivid portraits of their personal lives and professional triumphs are woven into the controversial details of America’s twenty-year entanglement in Southeast Asia.

[Elevate Difference · Rating 3 out of 5]

Joyce Hoffman read a book about journalists who reported on American involvement in Vietnam in the sixties and wondered to herself, “Where are the women?” Considering that she holds a Ph.D. in American Studies, a job teaching journalism to college students, and pens a biweekly op-ed column about journalism accuracy and fairness issues, it was not unlikely that she would write the book that would answer that question. On Their Own offers a thoroughly researched account of fifteen women who played vital, if varying, roles in the reporting of the Vietnam War.

For myself, when I studied the media industry in college, I became so disenchanted with the corporate system of information dissemination in the United States that instead of packing the tailored black suit in my closet upon graduation, I grabbed a rucksack and waited tables for awhile. But journalism still fascinates me, and for that reason, I wish that I had read this book in school. Many of these women simply bought a plane ticket and showed up in Saigon, determined to find their own stories. They believed that if they did their job well, they would be published by many of the male editors who told them they couldn’t do it in the first place, as they indeed were.

As a pleasure read, On Their Own can be a bit dense with historical detail that sometimes stifles the narrative of each experience; however, this detail makes the book richer for any student of the history of journalism. I had a hard time getting started with it, but I soon realized that my difficulty was because the first 100 pages deal mainly with more socially conservative women who believed in the United State’s right to be in Vietnam and felt that the people there needed to be Westernized for their own good - talented and outspoken reporters, but not women I wanted to spend much time with. Once I got into chapter three, I found stories that were not only adventurous, but personally inspiring.

Frankie Fitzgerald’s story is one that any aspiring and socially conscious non-fiction writer should become acquainted with. Daughter of the CIA’s director of operations, she spent years in Vietnam, on her own, writing with a sense of purpose. Convinced that the war was immoral and wrong, she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1972. “She once asked a Vietnamese associate what he thought would happen if the United States withdrew. He told her: ‘Don’t ask us that. It’s none of your business. We just want you to leave.’”

Reporting on a war requires much more than death tolls and fire fight descriptions. Today, it seems obvious that different perspectives on the impact of war on societies engaged in it add invaluable relevance to that body of journalism. We are still faced with government influence and spin. The more people are reporting on events, the better we can understand them and use that knowledge to avoid mistakes in the future. Right?

Review by Jen Wilson Lloyd

[Boshika Gupta · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is, by no means, easy reading. There is A LOT to take in and I suppose, it is not everyone's cup of tea.

However, if you are intrigued by the experience of women journalists in the Vietnam War, go for it!