VIETNAMESE LANGUAGE IMMIGRATION

HISTORY AND PRESERVATION IN WASHINGTON

By: Simean Yang

Simean Yang

5/9/2015
HONORS 394
The Vietnamese Language
The purpose of this final paper is to continue to explore how Vietnamese language is
being taught and preserved in Washington State. Just for summary, Vietnamese is the both the
national and official language of Vietnam. It is considered the main language of the ethnic
Vietnamese (Kinh) people. Around 93 percent of adults in Vietnam are literate. There are
approximately 86 million speakers of Vietnamese in the world. Out of these 86 million speakers,
70 million of them learn Vietnamese as a first language while the other 16 million learn it as their
second language (Vietnamese).
According to the 2010 census, there are 1,381,488 speakers of Vietnamese. These
speakers are 5 years or older in the United States. This marks a 600 percent increase in the last
30 years, due to Vietnamese immigration. Moreover, there are 66,575 Vietnamese people who
are living according to the 2010 census in the state of Washington. Vietnamese has 3 main
dialects that are called the Central Vietnamese (Hue), the Northern Vietnamese (Hanoi), and the
Southern Vietnamese dialect (Saigon) (Vietnamese).
Vietnamese immigration of the United States of America tends to be categorized in three
waves. During and before the fall of Saigon, the first of wave of Vietnamese immigration
occurred when the South Vietnamese government collapsed near the end of the Vietnam War.
The Vietnamese who immigrated stayed in military camps in the United States until they could
be supported by church or non-profit organizations. The Vietnamese who immigrated during the
first wave were military personnel and urban, educated professionals who felt like they could
become targeted by the North Vietnamese government. Approximately, 125,000 Vietnamese

immigrants arrived to the United States during the first wave. Then, in the late 1970s and early
1980s, the second wave of Vietnamese immigration occurred which has been informally called
the era of boat people, since the immigrants actually left Vietnam in small fishing boats that
they had constructed by themselves through whatever material they could salvage. Since the
boats that the Vietnamese immigrants created were relatively fragile and unstable, death rates in
the second wave of Vietnamese immigration were fairly high due to starvation, storms, or
complete boat collapse. The main motive of Vietnamese immigrants in the second wave was to
find a way to move away from the newly formed authoritarian government that the North
Vietnamese government had enforced after the Vietnam War. Around 400,000 Vietnamese
escaped Vietnam in this the second wave of Vietnamese immigration. These immigrants entry
into the U.S. was eventually carried out by the Refugee Act of 1980 (History of Vietnamese
Immigration).
The final and third wave of Vietnamese immigration to the United States happened in the
1980s and 1990s. Several thousands of the Vietnamese immigrants during the third wave were
Vietnamese Amerasians who were the children of U.S. servicemen and Vietnamese mothers. A
good number of political prisoners from the Vietnam War were also immigrants. The primary
goal of Vietnamese immigrants from the third wave was to reunite with relatives that had
immigrated to the United States from the other previous waves of Vietnamese immigration. As
for Vietnamese immigration in the state of Washington, in 1975, the governor of WA allowed 500
immigrants from the first wave of Vietnamese immigration to settle. By the 1980s, the
Vietnamese population in Washington grew rapidly to 30,000 and is still growing.
After researching a lot about Vietnamese immigration and language statistics, I asked
myself How is the Vietnamese language being taught and preserved in Washington State? In

order to answer this question of mine, I took a visit to Van-Lang Vietnamese Language and
Cultural School in Seattle. This school is heavily dedicated to teaching, promoting, and
preserving the Vietnamese language and culture. I took some time to interview Dr. Savio Pham,
who is a heritage speaker of Vietnamese, an immigrant from Vietnam during the second wave of
Vietnamese immigration, and the main principal of Van-Lang. According to Dr. Pham, Van-Lang
was created by a group of teachers, who after the South Vietnamese government collapsed in
1975 decided to immigrate to the United States and settle in Seattle. As the creators of Van-Lang,
they were very dedicated to the task of preserving and promoting the Vietnamese language and
culture. They wanted to do this so that future generations of Vietnamese-Americans and other
Americans not familiar with Vietnamese language and culture could have to opportunity to
embrace Vietnamese language and culture. One interesting theme that Dr. Pham stressed to me
during the interview was the idea that language and culture are inseparable. Dr. Pham told that
without language, one cannot communicate his or her culture. On the other hand, without culture,
one cannot use his or her language to communicate the ideas of a culture to others. Dr. Pham
strongly believes that an ethnic group that does not have a strong connection to its language
inevitably does not have a concrete sense of identity. It will eventually be replaced and
eliminated by other cultures as time passes ("How I Never Learned to Speak Vietnamese - The
Seattle Globalist). Dr. Pham fears that Vietnamese language and culture might be forgotten in
the United States and want to utilize his experience at Van-Lang to help prevent the loss of the
Vietnamese language
Currently, the student enrollment at Van-Lang has been able to reach a laudable high of
300 students per year. Around 30 to 40 volunteer teachers actively lead 16 classes that specialize
in kindergarten to 7th-grade level Vietnamese. Surprisingly, funding for Van-Lang comes purely

from the pockets of Dr. Pham and the volunteer teachers alongside donations from other
Vietnamese families. Furthermore, there exists a VSL class (Vietnamese as a Second Language)
for non-Vietnamese speaking adults who want to learn Vietnamese, and also an ESL class
(English as a Second Language) for Vietnamese adults who want to learn English. According to
Dr. Pham, there are actually five other Vietnamese language and cultural schools similar to VanLang that are located on the west side of Washington with similar goals and interests. In
conclusion, Dr. Pham really dreams about inspiring young Vietnamese-Americans to rediscover
their culture, identity, and roots through just the process of taking time to learn the Vietnamese
language. He strongly believes that being multilingual benefits a person since he feels that it
allows them to think critically through different perspectives. I can definitely relate to this idea
since as a Korean-American, I have grown up being used to two different cultures that are based
on different ideals and traditions. For example, collectivism is appreciated in Korean culture
while individualism is appreciated in American culture. Being able to understand both
collectivism and individualism through my experience of two cultures and languages has really
given me a balanced view of the world in my opinion. This is why I feel that Dr. Pham is right in
his mission to promote and preserve the Vietnamese language in Washington.
Van-Lang and other schools similar to it in Washington continue to help spread and
promote the Vietnamese language to Vietnamese-Americans and other various types of audiences
in Washington. Moreover, the Vietnamese language is also being taught in Washington through
various high schools, community colleges, institutions, and universities. For example, according
to 2013 OSPI CEDARS database, 17 high schools in Washington that are located in Whatcom
and King County actively offer Vietnamese as a foreign language (Reports). Moreover, both
the University of Washington and the Seattle Language Institute and the University of

Washington also offer different classes to students who also want to learn the Vietnamese
language. One interesting discovery that I have made about the various centers in Washington
that teach the Vietnamese language including Van-Lang is that the main dialect of Vietnamese
that is taught to students is the North Vietnamese, Hanoi dialect. Out of the three major dialects
spoken within Vietnam, the Northern dialect still serves as the standard of the Vietnamese
language and holds the most respect and prestige. One main reason for this seems to be due to
the outcome of the Vietnam War where the North Vietnamese government came to unify the
entire country and also the fact that the majority of speakers of Vietnamese in Vietnam speak the
Hanoi dialect. Apparently, the prestige that the Hanoi dialect carries has also carried over to
Vietnamese language schools in Washington. This is interesting to note since most Vietnamese
immigrants in the United States have been from the south portion of Vietnam, speaking the
Southern dialect of Vietnamese. Thus, even in the United States, the Hanoi dialect is still taught
as the right way of speaking Vietnamese despite the numerous amount of speakers of the
Southern dialect of Vietnamese.
It seems that many linguistic scholars do not like the notion of the Hanoi dialect as the
superior dialect and have claimed that this view causes the other dialects of Vietnamese to be
devalued and progressively forgotten. Moreover, these scholars feel that seeing the Hanoi dialect
as the standard of Vietnamese causes the loss of a comprehensive view of Vietnamese language,
culture, and history. In essence, teaching and promoting the variation in Vietnamese language
helps students see how Vietnamese has evolved and how it continues to be shaped by
geographic, historical, social, and ethnic factors (The Non-Issue of Dialect in Teaching
Vietnamese).

My interview with Dr. Bich-Ngoc Turner who is a professor at the University of

Washington who teaches the Vietnamese language also reinforced to me the idea that many
linguistic scholars want to promote and teach all the dialects of Vietnamese in the United States.
Interestingly, Dr. Turner doesnt believe that Vietnamese has three different dialects, but actually
only 3 different accents. She doesnt believe that the dialects have enough distinction between
them to warrant them as dialects. Moreover, although she mainly teaches the Northern dialect of
Vietnamese in classes at the University of Washington, Dr. Turner also likes to incorporate the
other dialects of Vietnamese in her curriculum since she feels that students benefit from learning
all variations of the Vietnamese language. Dr. Turner feels that over the past few decades, the
different dialects of Vietnamese have become more equally represented in Vietnamese media
such as in television and newspapers. She hopes to continue this trend through her teachings at
the University of Washington. On the topic of preserving the Vietnamese language in
Washington, Dr. Turner stressed to me that the primary force that will keep the Vietnamese
language alive in Washington is the obligation to pass down the Vietnamese language that many
Vietnamese immigrants such as Dr. Pham feel. As long a Vietnamese immigrants keep arriving,
Dr. Turner feel that future of Vietnamese is bright. Moreover, she feels that that the motivation of
Vietnamese-Americans to learn the Vietnamese language in order to understand Vietnamese
culture better and their desire to communicate with their relatives will all help keep Vietnamese
alive in Washington and the United States.
My final interview with Huy Yao, a 19 year-old Vietnamese-American who was born in
Saigon, helped consolidate my findings about Vietnamese language preservation and the idea
that all dialects of Vietnamese should be promoted. On the topic of Vietnamese language
preservation, Huy stressed to me how he was disappointed with the Vietnamese Student

Association (VSA) at the University of Washington since he felt that it does not do enough to
promote the Vietnamese language. Huy feels that VSA focuses too much on Vietnamese culture
and not enough on the language. As a native speaker of Vietnamese, Huy feels that it is
uncomfortable to be in a Vietnamese student association where few speak Vietnamese. He really
wants to promote the Vietnamese language within VSA because just like Dr. Pham and Dr.
Turner, he feels that Vietnamese language is a major part of Vietnamese culture. On the topic of
the different Vietnamese dialects, Huy was adamant about how he felt it was wrong that the
Northern dialect was seen as the standard. He feels that this view overshadows the rich history
and diversity of the Vietnamese language. As a young person growing up in Saigon, Huy always
felt that the way he spoke Vietnamese with the Southern dialect was inferior due to the
Northern dialect being seen as the standard. In conclusion, as a result of my research of the
Vietnamese language, I have learned about two very central ideas about the Vietnamese language
in the United States: that it is inseparable from Vietnamese culture and that all of its dialects
should be represented in order to fully appreciated Vietnamese language.

Works Cited
"History of Vietnamese Immigration." History of Vietnamese Immigration. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May
2015.

"How I Never Learned to Speak Vietnamese - The Seattle Globalist." The Seattle Globalist. N.p., 17
Feb. 2014. Web. 12 June 2015.
"Reports." Mapping & Enhancing Language Learning (MELL) in Washington State. N.p., n.d. Web. 10
May 2015.
3611, Issn 1932. The Non-Issue of Dialect in Teaching Vietnamese (n.d.): n. pag. Web.
"Vietnamese." Ethnologue. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2015.