hongdiemle
The American Dream
Diem Le, "The American Dream", digital photograph,2007,_Diem Le's Collection_,Kennesaw, GA.
In early 1975 the upper and middle class of South Vietnam who left Vietnam in fear of the new government to the U.S. as of political reasons.
Accoding to Joe Ferry in "The Vietnamese in North America","The U.S. Census, a survey of the nation's population taken every 10 years, indicated that in 2000 there were 1.1 million Vietnamese people living in the United States. From 1990 to 2000, the Vietnamese population in the United States almost doubled in size. ",and that "People of Vietnamese descent living in the United States account for about 10 percent of the Asian American population. "(5)
This pictures I took at a church in GA of a group of second generation of the Vietnamese Americans in America. These children, their parents I know, most of them left Vietnam during the 1980s as of economic reasons. After the war ended, the communist government didn't manage the coutry economy well. There was the long war and there was those persons who good at fighting run the country. Many peole find themselves poor and hungry. During the 1980s, people secretly built boats and save or sold their properties to keep with them because they wanted to escape Vietnam. Their destination is to come to America for they heard of "the American Dream" where they could find jobs and their children would have a better life. Most of these people escaped by boat, the majority of them ended up in the United States of America, but many of them got killed or raped by pirates at the sea. Many Vietnamese ended up in HongKong,Indonesia,Philippines, Australia and European countries that government allowed them to stay. "Since the 1970s, on average between 25,000 and 40,000 Vietnamese per year have come to North America. In just three decades, this large-scale immigration has increased the Vietnamese presence in North America from a few hundred to more than a million."(5) In another word, those Vietnamese people wanted to leave their country after the war and they hoped for a better life esle where.
As we see in this photo,the children are dressed in Vietnamese traditional dresses, called "ao dai",transalted in English,means "long dress". Vietnamese people wear that kind of dress usually in special events as to remember their culture. My mother personally thinks that is the best kind of dress she has ever seen,and it is her opinion.But many Vietnamese families I know love to wear that dress and they are very proud wearing it. It's part of their culture,and dressing is one way to show it. If you see any Asian dressing like that, you'll know they are Vietnamese or at least having some relationship with the Viet people.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boat_people
Sources:
Joe Ferry, “The Vietnamese in North America”, Vietnamese Immigration (2003): 5.
Emily S. Rosenberg, Spreading the American Dream (New York: American Century Series, 1989),235-250.
Oscar Handlin,Race and Nationality in American Life (Little,Brown and Company: An Atlantic Monthly Press Book, 1975),134.
Vu Hong Pham," Beyond and before Boat People: Vietnamese American History before 1975", American History and Life (2003): 267.
The American Dream
Diem Le, "The American Dream", digital photograph,2007,_Diem Le's Collection_,Kennesaw, GA.
In early 1975 the upper and middle class of South Vietnam who left Vietnam in fear of the new government to the U.S. as of political reasons.
Accoding to Joe Ferry in "The Vietnamese in North America","The U.S. Census, a survey of the nation's population taken every 10 years, indicated that in 2000 there were 1.1 million Vietnamese people living in the United States. From 1990 to 2000, the Vietnamese population in the United States almost doubled in size. ",and that "People of Vietnamese descent living in the United States account for about 10 percent of the Asian American population. "(5)
This pictures I took at a church in GA of a group of second generation of the Vietnamese Americans in America. These children, their parents I know, most of them left Vietnam during the 1980s as of economic reasons. After the war ended, the communist government didn't manage the coutry economy well. There was the long war and there was those persons who good at fighting run the country. Many peole find themselves poor and hungry. During the 1980s, people secretly built boats and save or sold their properties to keep with them because they wanted to escape Vietnam. Their destination is to come to America for they heard of "the American Dream" where they could find jobs and their children would have a better life. Most of these people escaped by boat, the majority of them ended up in the United States of America, but many of them got killed or raped by pirates at the sea. Many Vietnamese ended up in HongKong,Indonesia,Philippines, Australia and European countries that government allowed them to stay. "Since the 1970s, on average between 25,000 and 40,000 Vietnamese per year have come to North America. In just three decades, this large-scale immigration has increased the Vietnamese presence in North America from a few hundred to more than a million."(5) In another word, those Vietnamese people wanted to leave their country after the war and they hoped for a better life esle where.
As we see in this photo,the children are dressed in Vietnamese traditional dresses, called "ao dai",transalted in English,means "long dress". Vietnamese people wear that kind of dress usually in special events as to remember their culture. My mother personally thinks that is the best kind of dress she has ever seen,and it is her opinion.But many Vietnamese families I know love to wear that dress and they are very proud wearing it. It's part of their culture,and dressing is one way to show it. If you see any Asian dressing like that, you'll know they are Vietnamese or at least having some relationship with the Viet people.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boat_people
Sources:
Joe Ferry, “The Vietnamese in North America”, Vietnamese Immigration (2003): 5.
Emily S. Rosenberg, Spreading the American Dream (New York: American Century Series, 1989),235-250.
Oscar Handlin,Race and Nationality in American Life (Little,Brown and Company: An Atlantic Monthly Press Book, 1975),134.
Vu Hong Pham," Beyond and before Boat People: Vietnamese American History before 1975", American History and Life (2003): 267.