This study investigated Giay and Hmong young adults' perspectives on Vietnam's contemporary education policy reforms and the sources of higher education inequities that are negatively impacting their communities. Specifically, this study investigated participants' schooling experiences from basic education to higher education. The study employed…

Beliefs of Life cycle (or life cycle - related beliefs) of ethnic minorities in the Northwestern region of Vietnam are the beliefs related to the lives of people in this region from birth to death which carried out through basic rituals such as: the rituals in childbirth, marriage, funeral and rituals of treatment, etc. The beliefs of life cycle…

While on a national level Vietnam has achieved--and surpassed--gender parity in education, restrictive social norms that value Hmong girls primarily for their future roles as wives, daughters-in-law and mothers have largely precluded their advancement to high school. Drawing on qualitative data collected in the country's Hmong homeland in Ha Giang…

This study reviews empirical data from the U.S. Census, American Community Survey (ACS) and academic journals to explore K-12 and higher educational outcomes pertaining to Southeast Asian American (SEAA) males. We argue that the empirical dismissal of SEAA males in social science research reinforces a longstanding agenda of structural neglect and…

Using a multiple case study design, I examine how public high school students (n = 17) make sense of narratives about defining events with which they have specific heritage connections. Focusing on 3 groups of students (Hmong, Chinese, and Jewish) studying 3 heritage events (respectively, the Vietnam War, Modern China, and the Holocaust), this…

This article presents the language policy and sociolinguistic realities of Hmong people in Lao Cai province, Vietnam. Minority children, who have their own mother tongue, are educated in Vietnamese, a language that few understand. In response to this situation, the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam in collaboration with UNICEF,…

The United States is home to more than two million refugees since 1975, with over half arriving as children. Refugees are semi-voluntary immigrants fleeing persecution in their home countries and seeking a country willing to resettle them. They may have experienced war, separation from or loss of family, and loss of home and basic needs. One…

In this article, the author provides a brief history of Hmong and traces the origin of Hmong story cloths. The Hmong, a nomadic and agrarian people, may date back 5000 years. Today they live in China, Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos, where during the Vietnam War and its aftermath, many Hmong were killed or persecuted for siding with the American…

This paper illustrates how a methodological tool called "drawing-voice" can be used to demonstrate qualitatively what statistical and policy data are not able to reveal regarding the educational realities of Hmong minority communities in northern Vietnam, particularly with regard to the role of local language and culture in school. This…

Similar to other Asian American students, Southeast Asian American students are often stereotyped by the popular press as hardworking and high-achieving model minorities. On the other hand, Southeast Asian American youth are also depicted as low-achieving high school dropouts involved in gangs. The realities of academic performance and persistence…

This article explicates the diversity within the Asian American community by focusing on Southeast and South Asian American students. Focusing on these two groups is important given their recent migration (relative to other groups) and tenuous position within Asian American research, discourse, and representation. In particular, this article…

Characteristics of the Hmong refugees to the United States are described, with emphasis on educational problems. Historians agree that the Hmong lived in China until about 1810 when they began to migrate to Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam. The evacuation of U.S. troops from Saigon in 1975 marked the beginning to the first wave of Southeast Asian…