Khang Nguyen

ENG 1010
Vietnam-America
We are losing our Culture
Dear Father John Pham.

The reason I write this letter is because I want you to understand that I am really

thankful for the things you do in the church. By teaching those kids our traditional

language (Vietnamese) you help them to not forget about our culture, Im a part of

it too, by teaching them Vietnamese, but there is something I want you to

understand about that.

First let talk about, our culture and history. According to Wikipedia The Free

Encylopedia: The culture of Vietnam is one of the oldest in Southeast Asia.

During the French colonial period, Vietnamese culture absorbed various influences

from the Europeans, including the spread of Catholicism and the adoption of the

Latin alphabet. Prior to this, Vietnamese had used both Chinese characters and a

script called Chu Nom which was based on Chinese but included newly invented

characters meant to represent native Vietnamese words.

In the socialist era, the cultural life of Vietnam has been deeply influenced by

government-controlled media and the cultural influences of socialist programs. For

many decades, foreign cultural influences were shunned and emphasis placed on
appreciating and sharing the culture of communist nations such as the Soviet

Union, China, Cuba, and others. Since the 1990s, Vietnam has seen a greater re

exposure to Asian, European and American culture and media. You see? Vietnam

culture is easily affected by different cultures (China, French, America), I dont

want that to happen again at here.

So, I will ask you a question. Does culture identity get lost due to globalization?

This is the same question by Ho Cong the Logistic Manager Central at Carlsberg

Vietnam ask us.

Lets talk more about our situation here. Why I have to write a title of this letter

We are losing our Culture? Because I see that since I moved here in America. I

see a lot of Vietnamese children, it is normal in here, but the thing is some of them

cant speak or at least are not fluent in Vietnamese. Because theyre born at here,

they learn and study here by the American culture surrounding them since they

were young. America is a national country where everybody is from a different

country with different culture, together they run this country. No matter where you

from, what is your color, what is your religion and your culture is, you are living in

this country. The important thing is you get the freedom at here. You dont have to

lose your culture to be a part. But those kids, just think about this, Father, for our

generation we still know what we are, where we come from, but how about the

next generation, about those kids, will they still know about it?
 Our first generation has come here to the United States since 1975. We have

come a long way at here. We have Vietnamese people and non-Vietnamese people

in here. This is the sentence Ho Cong the Logistic Manager Central at Carlsberg

Vietnam says: We are living in a flat world where any geographical separation

becomes irrelevant. Under global forces, societies are on the way to transform to

be closer together and to share many things in common.. I will repeat the question

he asked us up there Does culture identity get lost due to globalization?. Cultural

identity or cultural main stream is established upon core values that are shared and

improved for a long time of development of a society. These values include

language, a system of belief, genetic traits, literature, customs and habits and many

other values that make one community different from the others. It takes a lot of

things, and together they are called by culture. The answer to the question is No,

the globalization isn't affected any of that. Its about us, it about how we are getting

to know about our culture and how we teach them to know more about it.

Here is some suggestion for this problem. Besides teaching those kids language,

we can tell them more about our history, talk with them and make them understand

how beautiful is it, and by that, they will find interesting about that. The old

generation is the problem too, there is a huge difference between culture, some

parent just dont understand, they teach their kids with the different opinion,

different point of view compared to here, it not working at all. Listen to them, ask
them what they want, understand what they need and by that get to know more

about them.

For the last word, I just appreciate for helped me this. I hope all the thing I wrote

in here, you will understand. And if I can, I want to be back there one more time.

Once again, thank you for your cooperation for everything.