Viet Kieu
Viet Kieu Word Origin
Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2001 21:17:41 -0800 (PST)
From: Caroline Valverde <valverdenews@yahoo.com>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Viet Kieu word origin
Dear List,
Hello. I am wondering if anyone would know about the origin of the word Vie^.t Kie^`u. What other words besides Kie^`u Ba`o and Ngu*o*`i Vie^.t Nam O*? Nu*o*'c Ngoa`i is used to mean Overseas Vietnamese?
Thank you very much.
Kieu Linh
Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2001 13:19:21 +0800
From: Adam Fforde <msefaj@nus.edu.sg>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu word origin
Bon Cali, bon Mat vv have been heard ...
Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2001 12:06:12 -0800 (PST)
From: D. Hoang <dieuhien@u.washington.edu>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu word origin
I'm sorry, could you put the diacritical marks on these words. I've never heard of "bon Lot, bon Cali, or bon Mat" before. Cali is used for California, but what are "Lot" and "Mat." And, by "bon" do you mean "bo.n"?
Another way that Overseas Vietnamese are called is "Ngu*o*`i Vie^.t Ha?i Ngoa.i". THis term may be more commonly used by Southerners, that is, those living South of the 17th parallel during the war. The term invokes an image of an intellectual and elite group of professionals and university students working or studying overseas, who were either rich or super smart (to get scholarships for studying abroad) or both. There were so few of this class of people that one would have been lucky to have met one of them.
"Vie^.t Kie^`u" in its current use, however, brings to mind a large group of loud, arrogant, spendthrift, flashily-dressed individuals who used to be "one of us," but now deem themselves more important due to their "Viet Kieu" status. Most Vietnamese in Vietnam these days would know at least one or two Viet Kieu and are often resentful or envious of them.
Dieu-Hien T. Hoang
Refugee & Immigrant Health Promotion Program
Harborview Medical Center/University of Washington
624 S. Washington
Seattle, WA 98104
Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2001 18:40:24 -0500
From: Regina M. Abrami <abrami@fas.harvard.edu>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu word origin
You might want to check this with a linguist - but from the looks of itpar "kieu" originates from the Chinese word "qiao" (with a person radical/signifier). It is a homonym with the Chinese word for bridge "qiao." (wood radical). Qiao, lacking either the person or wood radical, is usually joined with other ideographs referring to movement or disguise. I suspect, however, that only a Vietnamese linguist, may be able to tell you when the actual term "Viet Kieu" entered the Vietnamese language. "Hai ngoai" is also of Chinese origin.
Regina
Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2001 03:21:09 -0500 (EST)
From: smg7@cornell.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu word origin
On Fri, 5 Jan 2001, D. Hoang wrote:
> "Vie^.t Kie^`u" in its current use, however, brings to mind a large
>group of loud, arrogant, spendthrift, <flashily-dressed individuals who
>used to be "one of us," but now deem themselves more important due to
<their "Viet Kieu" status. Most Vietnamese in Vietnam these days would
<know at least one or two Viet <Kieu and are often resentful or envious
<of them.
I must take issue with D. Hoang's post shown above. I have just finished 14 months of field work interviewing rural farming households in the Mekong Delta. I selected those households on the basis of their receipt of overseas remittances and frequent reunions at home with remitting relatives. Some of my interview questions deal specifically with indigenous impressions of returning overseas Viet-Kieu. My findings - and this surprised me - is that returning V-K are seen to act like ordinary local people, 'unchanged' in their material and emotional relations to their former parental, marital or sibling households. The same largely applies to the returnees' attitudes towards often rustic neighbors and even to local authorities that some either feared or despised at the time of their departure. "Humble," "modest," and "loving" were the most frequently used adjectives by family members, by neighbors, officials, and key informants. There are exceptions to my broad-brush descriptions, however, but assuredly applying to not more than ten percent of the returnee population I dealt with. I previously applied the same methodology for two years with farming households and returnees (overseas contract workers) in Luzon, Philippines. The characteristics D. Hoang cites do occur more frequently in that more developed market economy with more ambiguous national identities than in VN, but again they are the exception and not the rule among rural populations (that are the vast majority in both regions).
Overseas migration and its effects on the migrants and their families is a vastly complicated topic, pitifully understudied in light of its global significance at present. Thoughtless and baseless stereotypes often do arise, unsurprisingly. In VN today, the investment and remittance wealth that Viet-Kieu contribute to the domestic economy is quite large, in the billions of US dollars annually, as is the 'outside' intellectual and cultural influences they exert on a formerly hermetic society. Developing and improving VN's state laws and regulations concerning the Viet-kieu is a burning political issue today, with multi-leveled, conflicting interests and ramifications. So misrepresenting the facts in a public forum is not excusable, even if unintended.
Respectfully,
Steve Graw
Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2001 09:55:10 +0100
From: duffy.daniel <duffy.daniel@wanadoo.fr>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu word origin
It was clear to me that Dien Hoang was expressing a thoughtful opinion based on her experience. I know that Dien's experience includes repeated visits from the United States to Viet Nam totaling a few years over more than a decade. She has had intimate and professional contacts with rural Vietnamese in three regions of the country. I expect that many of those people take her for an insider rather than an outsider.
So I give her opinion weight in evaluating Steve Graw's. His views have the weight of a survey, compounded by the individual perceptions of the surveyor and his own similar work in another nation in the same region recently. Surveys reveal structure and comparison reveals context. I would like to hear more about the complexity that these procedures have discovered to Steve, and whether he has a general explanation.
Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2001 17:34:15 +0100
From: duffy.daniel <duffy.daniel@wanadoo.fr>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu word origin
On today's Radio France International (AM 738 at 1600 Paris time) broadcast, the critic Hoang Ngoc Hien and the journalist Nguyen Qui Duc were interviewed from "Dai Hoc Connecticut" (?) about contemporary Vietnamese literature. I didn't hear Hien utter "viet kieu" or "hai ngoai." He spoke of those authors "trong nuoc" and those "nuoc ngoai."
Both Hoang Ngoc Hien and Nguyen Qui Duc would have an informed idea of who was listening and what they want to be called. Hien is an academic born in the center region and educated in the Soviet Union who made his career in Vinh and Ha Noi and now is in dialogue with Vietnamese intellectuals everywhere. Duc left the South in the 1970s and has made his way in both English and Vietnamese language journalism outside of Viet Nam.
Duc, the younger man, speaking second, seemed to follow Hien's lead in this but did say "hai ngoai" a couple of times. Going through my shelf I see that "hai ngoai" does seem to be the bland usage, e.g. "20 Nam Van Hoc Viet Nam Hai Ngoai" (Dai Nam, Glendale, 1995). By contrast, a book that doesn't care who it offends, Nguyen Ngoc Ngan's satiric novel "Coi Dem" (Lang Van, Canada, 1991) introduces the protagonist as follows:
"Ga la nguoi Viet kieu vua tu Canada ve tham nha!" (final sentence, first paragraph, p.7).
The joke in this sentence, the amibiguity in the connotation of "Viet kieu", is the crux of the novel. Ga is an unspeakable fool and he enjoys great respect in Saigon. The irony in "Vietkieu" is available to Nguyen Ngoc Ngan because it is a word that has been applied to a dizzying number of situations in the last few decades. If "Viet Kieu" is ambiguous, and "hai ngoai" is neutral, are there any unambiguously pejorative words? How did the SRVN refer to those who had left the country without permission when it was still maintaining that they were criminals?
Date: Mon, 08 Jan 2001 10:16:54 +0000
From: Greg Pringle <pengrui@163bj.com>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu word origin
Regina is essentially correct.
The character 'qiao' (second tone) means 'to live abroad' or 'person living abroad'. This character is written with the person radical on the left and a character on the right meaning 'tall' or 'disguise'. However, the radical on the right has no connection with the character's meaning, having a phonetic function only (i.e., to indicate the pronunciation).
The Chinese term 'huaqiao' refers to Chinese people living overseas. Strictly speaking it refers only to Chinese people who retain their Chinese nationality. Those with foreign nationality are called 'meiji huaren' (if they have American citizenship), 'aoji huaren' (if they have Australian citizenship), etc. They may also be called 'huayi' ('descendants of Chinese').
The Japanese word 'kakyoo' is written with the same characters as 'huaqiao' but has a slightly different meaning. 'Kakyoo' refers to all Chinese living overseas, whether or not they have obtained foreign citizenship. I do not have any information on the birth of the term Viet kieu in Vietnamese, but it is quite clearly modelled on the Chinese expression.
I would be quite interested to know if the term Viet kieu has any implications regarding citizenship status.
HTH
Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2001 00:15:44 -0500 (EST)
From: Nhung Tuyet Tran <ntran@history.upenn.edu>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
Dear All,
I had occasion to ask a philologist and a linguist about the origins of the word "Vie^.t Kie^`u" in Vie^.t Nam. In two different contexts, they gave me the same answer. In one conversation, my nom tutor was simply explaining the difference between "hua qiao" and on a different occasion, the other tutor and I were having a conversation about how pejorative the word seemed to my ears.
The gist of their explanation about the meaning of the word in the Vietnamese context is this: "the character kie^`u represents a sojourner, a temporary visitor, and in the context of the Vietnamese, one who depends on the beneficence of another country," or, to use their words, "ngu*o*`i o*? nho*` nu*o*'c kha'c" If we accept the explainations of these two Vietnamese scholars, then questions arise as to the legitimacy of using the term for overseas Vietnamese. Overseas Vietnamese certainly have not temporarily settled in other countries, nor do they intend to return to Vie^.t Nam." And, on a more personal note, I certainly do not depend on the beneficence of the US government. After all, each year, the local, state, and federal governments take what they can from my paltry stipend. Being and accepting the label, "Vie^.t Kie^`u," somehow makes one less of an American and even stateless.
The use of the label also affects academia. When I am introduced by Western academics as simply, a "Vie^.t Kie^`u," I am associated with their understandings of Vietnamese-American ethnic politics, fanaticism, and allpar else that they detest in the Southern California community, and the label signals that to the person to whom I am being introduced. When labeling one as a "Vie^.t Kie^`u," these academics have essentialized the nature of overseas Vietnamese politics and culture as simplistically anti-communist and materialistic. However, this image is probably based on a small vocal minority. By calling someone a "Vie^.t Kie^`u," academics signal these "essential characteristics" that they assume any overseas Vietnamese shares. I have always thought it humorous and would smile inwardly, wondering whether the academic who labeled me a Viet Kieu to signal my social, political, and cultural affiliations could have guessed that I was partly raised by a Jewish family in Texas. This personal observation brings to mind the broader issue of whether academia has been able to move beyond essentializing groups.
Since moving to Los Angeles, I have noticed that the Vietnamese population takes great effort to avoid the term Viet Kieu. They tend to prefer to use ddo^`ng ba`o, ha?i ngoa.i, etc.
Nhung Tuyet Tran
Date: Mon, 8 Jan 2001 08:41:50 -0800 (PST)
From: Nha Trang <nhatrang_tonnu@yahoo.com>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
Dear All,
I don't know the current usage of the term, but previously "hoa kie^`u" was used by Vietnamese to refer to Chinese living in Viet Nam, the distinction being not clear as to whether they were born in China or in Viet Nam, so long as they lived the Chinese way and spoke Chinese as the first language (one example being Chinese in Cho Lon). I am not sure if they had to have Vietnamese citizenship, but there existed a reference to "ngu+o+`i Vie^.t go^'c Hoa" (Vietnamese of Chinese origin).
I agree with Nhung Tuyet that the term Viet Kieu as applied wholesale to overseas Vietnamese in the present context does have an unpleasant taste. It is a misnomer which, like many other artificial concepts, carries some political manipulation. During the war, there was a vocal Hoi Viet Kieu Yeu Nuoc (Asssociation of Patriotic Overseas Vietnamese, or of Patriotic Vietnamese in Foreign Lands)in France, Canada and the US, and maybe in other places I did not know of, a largely leftist organization of mostly intellectual Vietnamese nationals. I wonder if the current usage of the term Viet Kieu, seemingly originating from Hanoi, has not been inspired by the name of that association to project a hopeful, propagandistic air of cooperation. On another level, it could be an arrogant claim that any person who has a touch of Viet blood in her/him is Vietnamese no matter where she/he was born and lives; and from there it is useful that whatever great achievements she/he attains would reflect well on Viet Nam. Or so the argument seems to go.
Cong Huyen Ton Nu Nha Trang
Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2001 01:52:29 -0800 (PST)
From: D. Hoang <dieuhien@u.washington.edu>
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu word origin
What a fascinating study! I would love to read about the process and findings of that study. It is indeed true that "Overseas migration and its effects on the migrants and their families is a vastly complicated topic, pitifully understudied," as Steve Graw suggested. The same goes for the effects of transnational migration on the societies that supply and those that receive the migrants. More studies on these areas, especially from the insiders' perspectives, are sorely needed. What I expressed in my previous posting were feelings, nuances, and connotations of the different words used to indicate "overseas Vietnamese." Such things are fuzzy, ambiguous, and subjectives. They are not facts, and should never be taken as such.
I'm not in the least bit surprised at the findings of Steve Graw's study among households receiving "overseas remittances and [having] frequent reunions at home with remitting relatives." Stereotypes are developed from a kernel of truth, based on superficial, infrequent, or no direct contact with the people subjected to the stereotypes. When family members who remain in the home country have frequent reunions and receive regular remittances from their emigre relatives, their perceptions, and therefore descriptions, of those relatives do not prescribe to stereotypes, but reflect their own opinions of the specific generous relatives. When it comes to opinions, attitudes, and stereotypes, there are multiple realities and no hard-and-fast facts. My opinion expressed in the previous posting regarding the feel of the term "Vie^.t kie^`u" represents one of those realities. As Dan mentioned, that opinion came from personal and professional experience working with, living with and among ordinary Vietnamese in HCMC, Ha Noi, and in villages from Cao Bang to Soc Trang over a total of 4 years spanning a 13 year period. To those with whom I've had extensive contact or to my own family members, I'm "different" from other Viet Kieu. They would often say that I'm "modest," or "loving," or "unchanged," and "unlike other Viet Kieu." When I went around the country in qua^`n -den, a'o ba` ba, no'n la', and de'p cao su and when Joe, my husband, told people we met on the road that I was "Vie^.t Kie^`u o*? My~", they often doubled over, laughed their heads off, and said: "-Du'ng ro^`i, Vie^.t Kie^`u My~ Tho thi` co'!" I developed a sense of the use of "Vie^.t Kie^`u" from comments of hundreds of people that I met, worked with, or lived with directing at Vie^.t Kie^`u as a group, not me as a person. Some of these people came from the two urban centers, but the larger proportion lived in rural areas in all regions of Vie^.t Nam. As other members of the list have shown, my experience is not unique. As an alternative to "Vie^.t Kie^`u," I prefer "kie^`u ba`o." The term has a warm and endearing quality that makes me feel hugged when I hear it.
Thank you for a thoughful discussion.
Dieu Hien
Date: Fri, 12 Jan 2001 05:12:26 -0500 (EST)
From: smg7@cornell.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Viet-Kieu (first of 2 posts)
Chi. Hoang ably clarifies her post that I faulted. I do reiterate that her original post UNINTENTIONALLY (caps for emphasis, not for flaming) distorted the situation. I suggest the following correction, adding the phrase in caps, "Viet-Kieu in its current use, however, brings to mind THE STEREOTYPE OF a large group ."par Hoang's reply lucidly reminds us that we are discussing the nuance of a specific term, Viet Kieu, and not sociological facts. This prompts me to pay more attention to such discourse analysis in reviewing my dozens of hours of taped and transcribed interviews - a task I've been immersed in for the last three months. I employed two different RAs, a male southerner and a displaced female northerner. The woman had led my farmer discussions and the man has only heard the tapes. The woman has also done some cross checking on my translations done with the man. So far I've only been concerned with "getting the discussions right." So suggesting a more critical ear towards discursive factors is well taken!
My respondents rately used the V-K word. Much more common were 1) ngu+`o+i o+? nu+o+/c ngo`ai (NONN), 2) ngu+`o+i o+? be^/n ("over-there people," a very farmer way of speaking, I suggest), and 3) ngu+`o+i vu+o+.t bie^n ("border crossers"). #3 tricked my ears for a while: I thought people were saying "vu+o+.t bie^?n," a logical equivalent for "boat people." But in fact, I never heard a Vietnamese language term for "boat person," or if I did, I didn't recognize it. That term may just be a western construction. As for more official usage, the press often writes of NONN, and less frequently, VK. An "official" Marxist (southern voice) view is found in the 1997 book titled "Ngu+`o+i o+? Nu+o+/c Ngoa`i" by Prof. Tra^`n Tro.ng -Da(ng -Da`n of the HCMC Social Science Institute. The 1989 (Hanoi) Tu+` -die^?n Vie^.t Anh of Dang Chan Lieu & Le Kha Ke says Viet Kieu = "Vietnamese national, Vietnamese resident (itals) in a foreign country (end itals)." Interestingly, this dictionary similarly lists Hoa - Kie^`u, substituting "Chinese" for "Vietnamese." A post on this thread suggested that the socialist regime either originated or appropriated the V-K term. To settle that question, someone might check the late Nguyen Dinh Hoa's 1959 (?) dictionary (reprinted by SIU Press but now out of print). I believe it contains the V-K term, proving a more longevity of the term {sure enough, just when I need it, my copy of Hoa is now in a cargo container since I've just changed countries of residence. "Next time you need a cop, call a hippy!"}To save the time and bandwidth of those not concerned, I will continue my discussion in a second message that the unbelieving can just trash.
sgraw
Date: Fri, 12 Jan 2001 05:18:45 -0500 (EST)
From: smg7@cornell.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Viet-Kieu (second of 2 messages)
Here are two other problematic Viet Kieu ideas. Dan D and Chi Hoang both use one or both the terms "insider" and "outsider." I previously chided another reader on this list for using what I see as these very fuzzy terms. By nature, the emigr'e9 experience of first and even second generation sojourners into the US melting pot is one of contradictory and compromised identities, cut along fault lines of being "in" and "out" of cultures abandoned and embraced. Categorical approaches to migration brings a-priori closure to both large scale and nuanced issues - hypothesized tautologies are sure to result. For example, one significant and current thread of migration literature introduces the concept of "multinational families and identities" to avoid diadic, nation-state based categories. This concept is seen as both a product and a determinant of 'new order', global market behavior. Extended overseas Vnese families who engage in black-market remittance transfers by fax, phone, or email - whereby neither cash nor capital cross state borders - are an empirical example. The recent appointment of a Filipino to the Canadian cabinet - a man expected to cement Canadian - Asian big business ties - is a case writ large of such migrant behavior.
Chi. Hoang's reference to "insider" is in the context of "doing Viet Kieu" geographically inside VN. As a foreigner and western scientist "doing research" in Asian fields, I am always haunted by the question of whether subjects are not just putting me on, or saying things that my narrative imagination (let alone limited linguistic skills) simply cannot grasp. I read into Hoang's post an epistemological sense close to Goffman's classic "Stigma" work, replete with marginality. But current post-modern (PM) attacks on the social sciences prompt us to think in a more "centered" fashion, especially when doing ethnography. A response to the PM confrontation and challenge has been the advent of standpoint epistemology (SE). SE arose out of ethical concerns over the possible unintended negative consequences of research contact with subjects, but in the hands and minds of feminist and post-colonial scholars, it has grown into a self-conscious deconstruction of researcher identities and power relationships with subjects. An intense ethnographic debate has arisen that now challenges the "static, bipolar construction of
insider/outsider status" (e.g. see the work of Nancy A. Naples at UCal Irvine) [contact me outside the VSG list for references, please].
Second and final is a matter that Greg Pringle points to in his question about VK citizenship issues. This is the "hot" political issue in the SRVN that I alluded to. Steve Denney just contributed a Jurassic gem: the 1979 SRVN statement on VK motivations in leaving. That post shows how quickly matters are changing in the post-Cold War world! The SRVN state and party first villified, then deeply distrusted most of the post-1975 overseas Viet community (for justifiable reasons I would argue). But in the last decade, tempers on both sides have cooled and intercourse between territorial VN and the overseas community serves the interests of almost all. Still, old policies and habits remain, and a principal problem for the state today is how to fairly and acceptably deal with returning overseas VNese. To answer Greg's question: not citizenship but socio-economic status for returning and visiting Viet Kieu is the issue. A two-tier pricing system for state run transportation and tourist services, basically doubling prices for foreigners, has been in place for some years now. "Loyal" overseas have been exempted by state regulations, but that raises the question of political correctness - what and who determines loyalty? My sense is that Vnese public opinion would like to just scrap dual pricing for all Viet-Kieu (but not for foreigners!), but then how do you determine who is "really" Vietnamese? And from the state's view, how do you exclude the few but still militantly vocal/violent hardcore RVN types (we US people would call them 'terrorists' if they were Muslims!)? So the Viet Kieu issue is politically loaded in the SRVN today. And the politics of the VK right continue to exert pressure in the US as well. VK who chose to visit VN in the '80s and early '90s frequently faced death threats and other intimidations from the VK right, as well as from the US government, if their visits became public knowledge. A well known VK author and philanthropist I know was harassed like that in the mid '80s through nasty phone calls and a whisper campaign within the Southern California VK community. The State Department and FBI also intimidated that person with hints that the person had been involved in overseas espionage, despite a complete lack of evidence. Violence against remittance company offices in North America also took place at that time. The intensity of attacks has slackened now that US policy towards VN has relaxed, but the (US and VK) right continue to focus their efforts in Congress to oppose MFN status and the yet-to-be-ratified US-VN Trade Agreement. VK, as I posted, are big players at the trade table - optimistic estimates of gross overseas remittances to VN exceed the volume of foreign direct investment there in 1999! So the obstructionist stance of the overseas right remains a serious problem in light of the par new US administration. Any crimp in Viet Kieu's confidence and ability to return to visit or live in the SRVN works to the disadvantage of VN's population as a whole.
Thanks.
sgraw
Viet Khieu pt. II
Viet Kieu
From dgm405@coombs.anu.edu.au Wed Mar 28 15:17:24 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 11:10:18 +1000
From: David Marr <dgm405@coombs.anu.edu.au>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Viet Kieu
Trawling through accumulated email after returning from a trip to Vietnam, I came across the early January VSG exchange about the meaning of `Viet Kieu', etc.
In early January, we discovered that Hanoi had declared that VK must be given the same price as homelanders for a number of weeks before and after Tet. Not only that, but foreign spouses and foreign-born children were to be treated the same way.
Naturally I set out to test this second dispensation at Vietnam Airlines in particular. The first time I was told that wedding certificates were required for foreign spouses and birth certificates for children. The second time, however, a very understanding clerk spent 45 minutes working her way up the chain of command to get us the homelander price (a saving of about 50%), based on shared surnames in passports. At the royal tombs in Hue I also succeeded in being treated like a homelander (90%saving!).
Sadly, the Tet dispensation is now gone. On previous trips I noticed some VK successfully passing themselves off as homelanders at the tombs, whereas others either could not or did not wish to. Of course, the ticket clerk could always ask to see their chung minh thu, but some VK had kept their old ones and produced them on occasion.
I wonder how many other countries in the world possess different official prices for outsiders and insiders?
David Marr
From msefaj@nus.edu.sg Wed Mar 28 15:17:59 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 10:08:47 +0800
From: Adam Fforde <msefaj@nus.edu.sg>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
"I wonder how many other countries in the world possess different official prices for outsiders and insiders?
David Marr"
In Singapore, foreigners on contracts (and thus visas) of less than two years' duration do not enjoy a 20% discount on hospital charges given to those on longer contracts (and so visas). In the UK, in principle,
non-residents pay a full fee for NHS services; residents do not. I have paid the first but not the second.
These examples are of course utterly different and could not be justified by reference to tax payments.
Adam Fforde
Dr. Adam Fforde, Senior Fellow
Rm AS3 06-14, Southeast Asian Studies Programme
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, NUS
SINGAPORE 119260
Tel: (65) 874 6865
Fax: (65) 774 8750
email: msefaj@nus.edu.sg
From weitzel@undp.org.vn Wed Mar 28 15:21:08 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 08:34:14 +0700
From: Vern Weitzel <weitzel@undp.org.vn>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
Son got me local price for airfare for the Quang Ngai trip. Also for airport bus, though she had to shout at
some people to get it. Son advises that we (mainly you, Dien and me I guess) get together some wording for the letter to acknowledge the tree at Son My. How should we do this?
Cheers, Vern
David Marr wrote:
>
> Trawling through accumulated email after returning from a trip to Vietnam,
> I came across the early January VSG exchange about the meaning of `Viet
> Kieu', etc.
>
> In early January, we discovered that Hanoi had declared that VK must be
> given the same price as homelanders for a number of weeks before and after
> Tet. Not only that, but foreign spouses and foreign-born children were to
> be treated the same way.
>
> Naturally I set out to test this second dispensation at Vietnam Airlines in
> particular. The first time I was told that wedding certificates were
> required for foreign spouses and birth certificates for children. The
> second time, however, a very understanding clerk spent 45 minutes working
> her way up the chain of command to get us the homelander price (a saving of
> about 50%), based on shared surnames in passports.
> At the royal tombs in Hue I also succeeded in being treated like a
> homelander (90%saving!).
>
> Sadly, the Tet dispensation is now gone. On previous trips I noticed some
> VK successfully passing themselves off as homelanders at the tombs, whereas
> others either could not or did not wish to. Of course, the ticket clerk
> could always ask to see their chung minh thu, but some VK had kept their
> old ones and produced them on occasion.
>
> I wonder how many other countries in the world possess different official
> prices for outsiders and insiders?
> David Marr
From emiller@fas.harvard.edu Wed Mar 28 15:21:24 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 07:09:47 -0500
From: Ed Miller <emiller@fas.harvard.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
>I wonder how many other countries in the world possess different official
>prices for outsiders and insiders?
>David Marr
It has been fairly routine in China for a while to have a three-tier set of prices at tourist sites and elsewhere: lowest price for locals, an intermediate price for overseas Chinese, and the highest for non-Chinese. I have a dim memory from the mid-90s of one case where the intermediate price was restricted to those "overseas Chinese" who were residents of Hong Kong and Macau (so Chinese from Taiwan, US and elsewhere had to pay the highest prices) but I can't recall where I saw this...
Ed Miller
From jhannah@u.washington.edu Wed Mar 28 15:22:06 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 09:04:20 -0800 (PST)
From: joseph j hannah <jhannah@u.washington.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Desides the issue of tax-based justification, I find the bureaucratic definitions of "outsiders" very interesting: immigration and visa-related in Singapore and UK, bloodlines/location of residence in the Vietnam and China cases. Clearly different sets of "identities" being created or reinforced.
Joe Hannah
From leaf@interchange.ubc.ca Wed Mar 28 15:22:26 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 09:38:18 -0800
From: michael leaf <leaf@interchange.ubc.ca>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
This is an interesting observation, and perhaps correct in principle but not necessarily so clear cut in practice. As a visiting scholar at a Chinese university in 1995, I was given documentation in order to obtain "local" prices. As the actual use of these letters required negotiation at every instance, the outcomes were a bit arbitrary. Quite often, I was able to obtain the local price while my "hua qiao" wife was not, ostensibly because her family name was not included in the letters. The strange irony on a number of occasions was that our "mixed" children (with my last name) would get the preferential local price along with me, while my wife, the only "true" Chinese among us, would be required to pay the full foreign price. But I don't think this represents policy so much confusion over its application.
Michael Leaf
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, Canada
From hphinney@u.washington.edu Wed Mar 28 15:22:41 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 09:35:28 -0800
From: Harriet M. Phinney <hphinney@u.washington.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
VSG members,
- This is a tangent to the Viet Kieu discussion, but Joe's response has prompted me to finally query the rest of you..
Related to the distinction between insiders and outsiders in regard to bloodlines, I am wondering if anyone has come across the use of the term "khac mau thang long" which I translate as "foreign blood smells fishy". I came across this phrase (again and again) when I was doing my research in 1996 on older single women choosing to get pregant out of wedlock. The phrase was mentioned in response to my questioning the common assumption that all women would rather have a child of their own rather than adopt a child (I am writing on the social construction of the desire for a biological child). The phrase was also used to talk about the difficulties of marrying someone who already had children - in particular difficulties with step-mothers or reasons why a woman would not want to marry a widower with children.
I am curious if anyone has come across the term "khac mau thang long" in any other contexts. 'Khac" does translates as "different", but when I was in VN a Vietnamese teacher I was working with translated it as 'foreign" and distinguished it from "different" in this phrase and I have another reference to it being translated as "foreign". I am wondering if the phrase, in addition to refering to non-family (blood) members, might have been or is used to draw distinctions between larger entities of people - such as an attempt to construct a difference between Vietnamese and "others" in the process of nation buiding. This is perhaps a wild guess.
Helpful comments, reactions?
Thanks so much,
Harriet
From dieuhien@u.washington.edu Wed Mar 28 15:22:59 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 12:27:26 -0800 (PST)
From: D. Hoang <dieuhien@u.washington.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Our American public universities and colleges have separate tuition fees for residents and non-residents. American students from out-of-state can pay the preferrential resident fees after one year of residing in that
state. This is not an option for foreign students.
The American airline industry is completely privatized, but it is not so for Vietnam Airline, or even Pacific Airline, if it still exists! So, the fact that the Vietnamese government subsidizes airfares for its citizens does not seem to be such an odd practice after all.
Also, I often complain bitterly about the different official pricing systems in Vietnam myself, being charged the much higher price, but, to put things in perspectives, back when I only had an Associate Degree and
was living and working in Vietnam, the international agencies for whom I worked paid me much more money holding similar positions as a "local" Vietnamese who may be a medical doctor, or a professor at a university
holding a Ph.D. Of course, I would have starved if paid the "local" rate, and charged the foreign rate for housing, etc.
Would things ever be black and white and clear cut?
Best,
Hien
From hhtai@fas.harvard.edu Wed Mar 28 15:23:10 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 15:46:07 -0500
From: Hue Tam H. Tai <hhtai@fas.harvard.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
I agree with Hien on this issue. Viet Kieu working on projects in Vietnam are paid at a higher rate than locals, so it should not be surprising that they are charged more than locals as well. For many, though, it is a matter of identity rather than money. Many Viet Kieu are distressed to be treated as not-quite-Vietnamese through this tiered pricing system. For many, the first trip home is the first time they confront their ambiguous
status after years of not feeling quite fully part of the new communities in which they live.
Hue-Tam Ho Tai
From nina@easynet.fr Wed Mar 28 15:23:20 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 23:39:33 +0200
From: Nina McPherson <nina@easynet.fr>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
To VSG list members:
For those following the viet khieu discussion : a wonderful, satirical story on the whole subject is NHA NAM by overseas Vietnamese author Tran Vu, which I translated for the short story collection, THE DRAGON HUNT (Hyperion, 1999). The narrator, a young overseas Nha Namese who closely resembles the author, returns home to Nha Nam, a country that closely resembles Vietnam. He is given a characteristically brutal explanation of tiered pricing by a certain famous writer "Th."
Nina McPherson
From TNguye12@exchange.calstatela.edu Wed Mar 28 15:23:32 2001
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 16:11:00 -0800
From: "Nguyen-Vo, Thu-Huong" <TNguye12@exchange.calstatela.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Hi Harriet Phinney,
I think the phrase you're refering to is "kha'c ma'u tanh lo`ng." As I understand it, it does not refer to foreign blood as much as actual kinship/bloodlines. I have not heard it used in the context of nation building vis-a-vis a construction of the Other.
best,
Thu-huong
From O.SALEMINK@FORDFOUND.ORG Wed Mar 28 15:23:48 2001
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 00:42:59 -0800
From: Oscar Salemink <O.SALEMINK@FORDFOUND.ORG>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Approximately one year ago there was a news item about a decree to abolish dual pricing in Vietnam. I have not seen that decree but when testing it for things like paying electricity or garbage collection fees my
interlocutors said that they also had "heard about" the decree but had not received specific instructions. Others told me that the implementation would be gradual.... but to my knowledge, nothing has changes so far.
I know that some of my VN friends don't like to have to pay "foreign prices" when visiting countries like China.
Oscar Salemink
From O.SALEMINK@FORDFOUND.ORG Sat Mar 31 14:02:29 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 00:08:31 -0800
From: Oscar Salemink <O.SALEMINK@FORDFOUND.ORG>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Apologies for the belated response. Just came back from an exciting AAS (great papers & panels!!!) to 250 unread messages.
I don't think dual pricing is good practice. Dual pricing will continue to justify the practice of different salaries. It will make VN less attractive for investment and for tourism purposes. Dual pricing serves to reinforce an image of foreigners as -- always, inevitably, undeservedly? -- rich.
Ironically, I know international volunteers (both Viet Kieu and non-Viet) who come to work in Vietnam for basically local salaries, and it is quite strange that they are forced to pay five times more than - for instance -
the rapidly growing group of rich Vietnamese.
Oscar Salemink
From oklahoma@netnam.org.vn Sat Mar 31 14:02:49 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 16:38:02 +0700
From: oklahoma@netnam.org.vn
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Dear Oscar,
I think this discussion will led to no where. I agree with Hien that things are not always black and white and clear cut...Off course dual pricing is not a good practice, but people practice it anywhere, not only in Vietnam. I found out that I was not eligible for a 50% discount on tickets to museums between Paris and Rome. I have been charged 50% more than local people in Cairo when I tried to ride a bus to the
pyramids...the list can be long...
It is not a good practice, but what we have done to prevent it? How about writing letters to newspapers, PACCOM, MOF...to raise the issue? How about starting to pay our local employees at the same rate that we
receive? It is fruitless just to say it was not good and it harmed Vietnam...
On the other note, while it was true that it was ironic when international volunteers had to pay five times more than ordinary Vietnamese, I did not know any international volunteer who works in Vietnam for basically local salary (let say 50US$ or 700,000VND). It least their living allowance is much higher than US$50.
Is it fair that I am paid four times less than an American who serves in the same position as I do? We can go as far as questioning ourselves if it is fair when our dinner can feed a whole family in two week in rural
areas...
Nguyen Thanh Son
From mkaradjis@hn.vnn.vn Sat Mar 31 14:03:03 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 22:44:42 -0800
From: Micheal Karadjis <mkaradjis@hn.vnn.vn>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
Absolutely right. As a western teacher in VN, my salary is so much higher than any Viet teacher we employ that it makes a mockery of the discussion. Then we have highly experienced Viet accountants and registrars who get $300, which is a huge wage by Viet standards but a fraction of what any westerner would get in these jobs, and meanwhile the receptionist only gets about $100, still pretty high, but not like the western tewacher all on over $1000 per month, and then considering so many westerners are here on salries many times that amount, especially if they work for the World Bank, the UN etc (often even with rent paid and tax taken care of) - I mean really, how is it possible that I can talk to expats that "bargain" with se om drivers
about whether they should pay 50c or 70c - it makes me want to throw up. How about the international "dual price" of labour - is that good policy? How about the reparations promised back in 1973 - why shouldn't Vietnam get a little extra given lack of any reparations and having to pay the debts of the Saigon regime? Surely the list can go on and on if we want to talk about double standards.
Michael Karadjis
From wturley@siu.edu Sat Mar 31 14:03:38 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 10:36:41 -0600
From: William S. Turley <wturley@siu.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: RE: Viet Kieu
Both Oscar and Son (see below), and everyone else for that matter, are correct on this subject. But a point that seems to have been missed, and which distinguishes VN (and other post-colonial countries, as Son suggests) from other cases cited, is that "dual pricing" can be informal and cultural determined as well as official and set by law. Anyone who lived/worked/travelled in southern Vietnam before 1975 will know that "dual pricing" can occur independently of policy because it is entrenched in the culture. In Saigon in the 60s, Vietnamese shopkeepers, street corner hawkers, market stallkeepers, and landlords all took for granted that
foreigners should pay more for everything (never mind what country they were from or what they earned). What struck me at the time was that what I perceived as gouging the "gouger" considered a morally ordered transaction. Questioning this moral order usually revealed that the "gouger" thought lthe whole world worked his way: "Don't rich people in the US pay more than poor people? No? Something is wrong with a country where they don't." The response might have suggested a levelling ethic at work had the practice not completely conflated "rich" with foreigner and "poor" with Vietnamese. It never did any good to point out that there were rich Vietnamese (vastly richer than I) and poor Americans. The only thing that mattered, to
go back to someone's earlier note, was whether you were an insider our an outsider.
I have no idea when or how "culturally constructed dual pricing" took root in Vietnam. If colonial rule and subsequent American behavior were not the cause, I assume they helped to entrench it. But because
this concept is embedded in the culture, I surmise that even policymakers of reformist bent have trouble grasping its negative consequences and that reducing or eliminating the practice will not occur soon or easily.
Cheers,
Bill Turley
From hhtai@fas.harvard.edu Sat Mar 31 14:04:00 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 23:27:34 -0500
From: hue-tam ho tai <hhtai@fas.harvard.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
Although I blanch at the discrepancy between what a Viet Kieu and a local Vietnamese may be earning for essentially the same qualifications and job, I was taken to task by local friends when I failed to drive down the price of pedicabs or mopeds. They argued that it was people like myself who drove prices up for everybody, and who incited sellers of goods and services to cater to foreigners rather than locals, amking them feel unwanted in their own country; I, of course, had been, like Michael, feeling guilty about haggling over the 50c that was being asked for a moped ride.
As for dual pricing in the South, I had a taste of ad hoc pricing in Chicago last week when trying to find a hotel room in the middle of the AAS plus a trade fair. Prices seemed to change by the minute!
Hue-Tam Ho Tai
From wturley@siu.edu Sat Mar 31 14:04:33 2001
Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 11:30:07 -0600
From: William S. Turley <wturley@siu.edu>
Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu
To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>
Subject: Re: Viet Kieu
I had precisely the same experience as Hue-Tam reports (below) on, I assume, a more recent visit than my stay in Saigon 34 years ago. It certainly was no mystery why Vietnamese, be they well-heeled or not, were left standing on the curb as taxis and cyclos zeroed in on foreigners. Plus ça change....
Bill Turley
>I was taken to task by local friends when I failed to drive down the price
>of pedicabs or mopeds. They argued that it was people like myself who
>drove prices up for everybody, and who incited sellers of goods and
>services to cater to foreigners rather than locals, amking them feel
>unwanted in their own country; I, of course, had been, like Michael,
>feeling guilty about haggling over the 50c that was being asked for a moped
>ride.
--
William S. Turley
Department of Political Science
Southern Illinois University
Carbondale, Illinois, USA 62901-4501
phone: (618) 453-3182
fax: (618) 453-3163