Shannon Castleman, USA/Singapore
Hanoi Vendors

Necessity is the mother of invention, and in Southeast Asia inventiveness combined with local traditions, and the need to make a living created many different types of street peddlers and itinerant occupations in most cities and towns. While technological advances and a free market economy has made life easier for some people, it is beginning to eradicate many small mobile businesses. As businesses have become more stationary and corporatized, the future looks bleak for the peripatetic entrepreneur in many places. For generation these small business owners have been able support their families with their mobile trades.

Globalism has transformed most cultures so that older traditions are struggling to coexist and survive in modern and increasingly cosmopolitan cities with quickly changing values and traditions. Developing cities in Asia such as Hanoi still have vibrant street cultures that include street peddlers in a myriad of different forms. This project aims to help to preserve and document many of these vanishing characters that were once found on nearly every street corner in Southeast Asia.