Vietnamese Americans
Vietnamese Americans are a significant group within the U.S. population, primarily stemming from the waves of refugees who fled Vietnam after the Vietnam War, particularly following the fall of Saigon in 1975. This community is diverse, encompassing various ethnicities including ethnic Chinese, Montagnards, Cham, Khmer, Hmong, and Amerasians, each with unique experiences and challenges during their transition to American life. By 2022, the Vietnamese American population exceeded two million, representing about 8 percent of the Asian American demographic, with a significant concentration in California.
The initial arrival of Vietnamese refugees was met with mixed reactions, including hostility and fear of job competition among some Americans. In response, the U.S. government implemented the Refugee Dispersion Policy to help settle these newcomers across the country, although this often led to separation from their families. Over time, many Vietnamese Americans gravitated toward larger urban areas with established Vietnamese communities, fostering a sense of support and cultural integrity.
Despite facing intergroup tensions, such as competition in industries like shrimping and incidents of violence, the community has largely worked towards mutual understanding and support. Vietnamese Americans have successfully established mutual assistance associations and other organizations to promote the welfare of their members, contributing to their integration while maintaining cultural traditions. Overall, Vietnamese Americans exemplify resilience and adaptation within a diverse American society, navigating challenges both from external and internal dynamics.
Vietnamese Americans
SIGNIFICANCE: Many Vietnamese refugees fled their homeland after the fall of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War in 1975. Although the rapid influx of Vietnamese immigrants into various North American communities caused some racial and ethnic tension with the majority culture, Vietnamese Americans have built a strong support system for themselves, thus easing their adjustment into American life.
Since 1975, many people from Vietnam have found their way to North America. Unlike many other ethnic groups who immigrated to the Untied States, the Vietnamese were technically not immigrants but refugees. As a result of the Vietnam War, which ravaged their nation in the 1960s and early 1970s, many Vietnamese were displaced. In addition, those Vietnamese who fought with the Americans against the North Vietnamese communists found themselves in danger after the U.S. withdrawal in 1974. In the weeks before the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon fell on April 30, 1975, the United States helped evacuate about 100,000 Vietnamese. This group, the first wave of Vietnamese refugees, were mostly well-educated city dwellers.
After the takeover of South Vietnam by the North, many more refugees left Vietnam for the United States. This group, known popularly as “boat people,” were mainly rural peasants or ethnic Chinese. Less well educated and less exposed to Western culture, the people in the second wave had more problems adjusting to life in the United States.
Demographics
By 1998, the population of Vietnamese Americans had reached one million. This population, however, was not a homogeneous group but contained several distinct ethnic communities. In addition to many ethnic Chinese, other minority groups fled communist persecution immediately after the war, including the Montagnards, the Cham, the Khmer, and the Hmong. A third group of refugees included the Amerasians, children of U.S. military personnel and Vietnamese nationals. Called bui doi (dust of life), the Amerasians were subjected to racial discrimination, harassment, imprisonment, and even death under the communists. Many became homeless and lived on the streets. More than 68,000 Amerasians settled in the United States under a special program. Various issues involving intergroup relations arose as these distinct groups found themselves in close contact with each other in the Vietnamese American community.
By 2022, more than two million Vietnamese Americans lived in the United States. Making up 8 percent of the Asian American population in the United States, a majority of Vietnamese Americans are immigrants. Only 40 percent of Vietnamese Americans were born in the United States. California has the largest population, with 35 percent of Vietnamese living in the state and a large portion, 16 percent, living in the Los Angeles area.
Intergroup Relationships
The first waves of Vietnamese immigrants met with some hostility from Americans. A 1975 Gallup Poll revealed that many Americans did not want Vietnamese refugees settling in the United States because Americans feared job losses. In response to this concern, the U.S. government developed the Refugee Dispersion Policy. Sponsors for Vietnamese refugees were sought from all over the country, and the immigrants were settled in various communities, often separated by great distances from their families. Although this policy made it easier to resettle the refugees, it did not take into account the high value the Vietnamese place on family connections. Consequently, after the initial resettlement, many Vietnamese moved closer to family members and other Vietnamese. Over time, such movement led to the growth of a number of Vietnamese American communities within larger urban areas such as Westminster, California, and Versailles, Louisiana.
One of the earliest examples of tension between the growing Vietnamese American communities and an established American community occurred along the Gulf Coast of Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi during the early 1980s. There, Vietnamese American shrimpers competed with established American shrimpers for an ever-decreasing shrimp catch. Language barriers, different customs, and differences in fishing techniques stood in the way of harmony between the shrimpers. Through programs offered by the U.S. Coast Guard (among other agencies), the two groups learned more about each other and were able to sort through most of their differences.
Perhaps the most tragic moment of intergroup hostility occurred in January 1989 when an American man opened fire with an assault weapon on a group of Cambodian American and Vietnamese American children at play in a schoolyard in Stockton, California, killing five children and shocking both the Vietnamese American and other American communities. As a result of what became known as the Stockton massacre, the two groups pulled together to establish a scholarship foundation and to work toward mutual understanding.
The Vietnamese community also experiences conflict within itself. Differing socioeconomic classes, education levels, and religious affiliations all affect the way that Vietnamese Americans interact with each other. In addition, some young, unaffiliated, male adolescent Vietnamese Americans have formed gangs that tend to prey on other Vietnamese Americans.
Although such examples of racial and ethnic disharmony exist, there are many positive examples illustrating the success of Vietnamese Americans in their new homeland. By establishing self-help groups such as mutual assistance associations and the Vietnamese American Association, the Vietnamese American community has provided strong support for its members. As Paul James Rutledge points out in The Vietnamese Experience in America (1992), Vietnamese Americans have maintained “cultural integrity” while adapting to the culture of the United States.
Bibliography
Arden, Harvey. “Troubled Odyssey of Vietnamese Fishermen.” National Geographic Sept. 1981: n.pag. Print.
Bass, Thomas. Vietnamerica: The War Comes Home. New York: Soho, 1996. Print.
Caplan, Nathan, Marcella H. Choy, and John K. Whitmore. Children of the Boat People: A Study of Educational Success. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 1991.
Kibria, Nazli. Family Tightrope: The Changing Lives of Vietnamese Americans. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993.
Long, Patrick Du Phuoc, and Laura Ricard. The Dream Shattered: Vietnamese Gangs in America. Boston: Northeastern UP, 1996.
Rutledge, Paul James. The Vietnamese Experience in America. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1992.
“Vietnamese Americans: A Survey Data Snapshot.” Pew Research Center, 6 Aug. 2024, www.pewresearch.org/2024/08/06/vietnamese-americans-a-survey-data-snapshot/. Accessed 15 Nov. 2024.