Vietnamese Youth and Internet

Article file from Asian Studies Newsletter Vol 46 #4

At 19:53 1/4/02 -0500

Dear list readers:

the following article (text and wp file attached) appears in the 'Viewpoints' section of the AAS's current Asian Studies Newsletter Vol 46 #4. I post it here FYI. I think it reflects the conundrum that faces all in-country researchers: 'it may be "my Vietnam" but how much of Vietnam does it stand for?' And in this case, issues of regionalism appear in the conclusion, but in rather circular fashion. And the case for collective 'healing' of the war among the youth is a tautology. I myself take issue with the art's emphasis that the Vietnamese people are sedentary and immobile. But then again, internal migration -- seeking employment, back to the que huong, religious and secular pilgramages, etc -- is infrequently studied, perhaps because it is often an uncomfortable topic for the state. Any other thoughts? AAS is propagating this, you know.

Respectfully,

steve graw

Coining an Electronic Dialect? Erasing Regional Differences in Vietnam In Internet Chat-Rooms.

By Christian Elizabeth Firpo, Ph.D. candidate, UCLA

The 1986 Doi Moi economic policy opened doors to foreign commerce and technology, and opened some minds to foreign ideas, creating the present environment of permissive electronic communication. The socialization produced by Internet cafes, e-mail usage, and participation in chat groups has created a communication savvy generation capable of communicating with the rest of the youth in the large municipalities of Vietnam. Ironically, the union of the North and the South has begun to have as much to do with the liberalization of electronic communication and foreign commerce as it does with the 1975 victory of Northern Communist forces over the South, which culminated in the expulsion of foreign powers from Vietnam.

For the generation of Vietnamese born since 1975, electronic communication has allowed the youth of Vietnam to sweep aside divisions of the thirty-year civil war that structured the lives of their parents and grandparents. When I have discussed divisions caused by the war with friends of mine from both the North and South, they have remarked that while ill feelings remain with the elders, the youth of Vietnam do not maintain these feelings. One friend from the North confided that she has good friends in Ho Chi Minh City. When I probed, I found to my surprise that even though my friends had not left their respective regions they could still name good friends in the other region who likewise had not traveled.

People from the North and the South maintained throughout the war--and have maintained since--that they all are Vietnamese people; However, because Vietnamese people do not move as frequently as Americans, they do not have a national, inter-city network of knowing one another through kinship, high school sweethearts or college buddies; In the past, Vietnamese students rarely went to school away from their hometown or province. Although such movement is becoming more frequent, it is still rare to move from Ho Chi Minh City, for example, to attend college in Hanoi.

Moreover, most youth are expected to take care of their family, and since they are rarely wealthy, they tend after graduating from college to remain in their family's house or nearby instead of moving across what was once the DMZ. In comparison with Americans, who form a network of personal ties with their countrymen and cities though frequent moves and vacations around the country, most Vietnamese cities have yet to be interconnected through personal and familial ties--despite a few major exoduses from the North to the South.

Nevertheless, within less than a year, Vietnam has begun rapidly to unite its parts and establish a closer-knit national community. Because the growing tourism industry has created an insatiable demand for more internet cafes and lower prices, the cyber trend is developing along the backpacking belt of Can Tho, Ho Chi Minh City, Da Lat, Nha Trang, Hoi An, Hue, and Ha Noi. The resulting availability of computers and internet access through internet cafes, and the steadily declining price of internet access;declining from 800 to 100 dong per minute over the past 18 months;means that adolescents and college-aged Vietnamese in these cities often spend after school hours chatting with others of the same age group in different regions of the country. Internet cafes have produced a chaos of communication, as youths run from computer to computer, reading others' conversations, establishing romantic cyber relationships, and learning about people of different regions.

Electronic socialization brings Vietnamese youths of different cities and regions into frequent contact with one another. While not yet meeting their countrymen from different regions of Vietnam physically, they now conceive of them, interact with them, build friendships, and share common experiences with them.

The cyber world allows youths to develop a sense of Vietnamese community and nationality that bridges old barriers and develops a common construct of the relationships between the North and the South. This gives them the concept of a unified Vietnam that their parents lack.

Time may demonstrate that the new Vietnamese cyber youth & those Vietnamese fortunate enough to be able to put the past behind them; will expedite a new national unification based on the virtual bond of cyberspace and a shared construct of community and nation.

Christina Firpo may be reached at cfirpo@msn.com.

From keyes@u.washington.edu Wed Jan 30 09:18:54 2002

Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 16:01:42 -0800 (PST)

From: Charles Keyes <keyes@u.washington.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: requesting article file from Asian Studies Newsletter Vol 46 #4

Dear VSG,

As president of the AAS, I take strong exception to Steve Graw's assertion that Christine Firpo's op-ed piece in the "Viewpoints" section of the Asian Studies Newsletter represents a position that the AAS is "propagating". The column of the Newsletter to which she has contributed is one that is open to members to express ideas that might be of interest to others in the association, but it in no way is a column that is used for pushing a particular AAS stance. The "Viewpoints" column is certainly open for alternative perspectives.

Biff (Charles Keyes)

From smg7@cornell.edu Wed Jan 30 09:19:05 2002

Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 23:48:52 -0500 (EST)

From: smg7@cornell.edu

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: requesting article file from Asian Studies Newsletter Vol 46 #4

Quoting Charles Keyes <keyes@u.washington.edu>:

> As president of the AAS, I take strong exception

>to Steve Graw's assertion that Christine Firpo's op-ed

>piece in the "Viewpoints" section of the Asian Studies

>Newsletter represents a position that the AAS is "propagating".

Dear Honorable President Keyes & list readers:

I plead guilty to use of the English language. The Oxford Talking Dictionary (1998 CD-Rom edition) provides the following definition (among several) of the transitive verb "propagate:"

Extend the action or operation of; transmit (motion, light, sound, etc.) in some direction or through some medium. M17. (the 'M17" bit means people have been using this form since the mid- 17th century - no generational issue in this one that I can see, ed.)

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Excerpted from Oxford Talking Dictionary

Reserved

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And to forestall other sundry flames, I wish to let list readers know that I CC'd my post to Ms. Firpo with an invitation to subscribe to the VSG listserve along with some rudimentary subscription information, should she not already be a subscriber.

Isn't my intent specific and straightforward in the post: to generate some discussion about the methodological and interpretive issues that Firpo raises in an AAS publication? I suppose one could say that she has a "position," but if that is the point of contestation, then what are the alternative positions?

And finally, if one is looking to cull subliminal codes or inferences out of what I posted, an alternative, even older Oxford definition might clear your air(e) too:

propagate: Hand down (a quality etc.) from one generation to another, pass on to one's descendants (spoken since the early 17th century). Isn't Firpo's issue about a generation gap?

Respectfully,

Steve Graw

From hhtai@fas.harvard.edu Wed Jan 30 09:22:59 2002

Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 08:45:43 -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: Fwd: Re: requesting article file from Asian Studies Newsletter Vol 46 #4

I've just returned from Vietnam and am still sorting through my mail. I finally read the AAS Newsletter piece that caused the tempest in a teapot. I take Biff's point that the Newsletter invites all to share their points of view, and that if one wishes to react to a piece, one is welcome. Still, I will confine my comments on Firpo's piece to the VSG list.

It's not a tautology (a logically circular argument) to speak of healing among youth; rather, it's an inaccuracy, just as is the statement that Vietnam's youth are "those fortunate to put the past behind them": whose past? not theirs--they have only their future: half of Vietnam was born after 1975. What do they have to heal? As for the internet creating a greater sense of national identity, I'd want a better sense of internet use. How do we know whether young Vietnamese limit their internet communications to other Vietnamese and what do they have to say to one another?

I agree with Steve that the stereotype of Vietnamese as being immobile masks a lot of migration, both long-term (the March Southward) and more recently. The current state of tension in the highlands is an illustration of the consequences.

On another note, the staff in my hotel seemed to be alternating watching Chinese historical melodramas and soccer matches. Local teams have boosted their strengths by hiring a few black players. Globalization is alive and well in Vietnam, for both good and ill. In one restaurant, the menu featured endangered animals; in another, a pamphlet produced by the WWF showed a golden monkey with the words" I am not a pet, a source of medicine, or even your lunch." The internet, in similarly contradictory fashion, may produce a greater sense of community among its local users, but also put them in touch with non-Vietnamese, with unforeseen consequences for the country as a whole.

Just my two cents.

Hue-Tam Ho Tai

From mginuk@supanet.com Wed Jan 30 09:23:09 2002

Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 14:48:56 -0800

From: Martin <mginuk@supanet.com>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Tempest in a teapot

For my first foray on VSG why not weigh in on the tempest in a teapot debate! First some info picked up today from Mekong Research's website:

"Vietnam closed out 2001 with 250,000 registered Internet users with accounts at one of four licensed ISPs. Not a lot of people considering that Japan will have as many Internet users as Vietnam will have people (about 87 million) by the year 2005. But do not forget the proliferation of Internet cafes that have been mushrooming around HCM City, Hanoi, and other cities. Industry estimates as to the actual number of Internet users in Vietnam is well over one million. Not too many, but not too bad considering the urban population of the country is about 15 million."

Plus who says Vietnamese youth don't have a past (Hue-Tam Ho Tai today)?

What about what your parents tell you, for a start? Though I share the point that people who have grown up or finished their education after 1975 may be less caught up in things of the past, have less need for healing.

With best wishes

Martin

Dr. Martin Gainsborough

British Academy Post-doctoral Research Fellow

University of Warwick

Direct line: 02476 523067

Tel. 01865 368353

Email. mginuk@supanet.com

From hhtai@fas.harvard.edu Wed Jan 30 09:23:21 2002

Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 11:07:14 -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: Tempest in a teapot

First, welcome to Martin. My comments about youth not having a past were intended to mean that it is not theirs: it's their parents' or neighbors'. Furthermore, young people in general are not particularly interested in the memories of old fogeys (speaking as the mother of one 13- and one 20-year old). As someone working on memory and commemoration, I know how reluctant most Vietnamese of my acquaintance are to rekindle painful memories. Many young Vietnamese do need to cope with the absence of parents who died during the war and its aftermath, but that is not the same thing as need to heal from their past. A lot of talk about the "past" is a way of thinking of Vietnam as being defined by the Vietnam War, and thus regional tensions. My talks with older people in northern Vietnam suggest that for many northerners, the memories are just as likely to be of the Land Reform campaign or the hardships endured during the 1940s.

Hue-Tam Ho Tai