Vietnamese American Research Articles

Disentangling individual and neighborhood differences in the intention to quit smoking in Asian American male smokers.

Numerous studies have assessed individual-level factors associated with intention to quit smoking. However, fewer studies have assessed how neighborhood and built environment also contribute towards individual-level behavior. We used baseline data of 340 Chinese and Vietnamese male daily smokers from August 2015 to November 2017 living in the San Francisco Bay Area, who enrolled in a lifestyle intervention trial. The outcome variable was intention to quit in 30 days. To understand the role of contextual factors participants’ residential addresses were geocoded, and neighborhood median income, ethnic composition, and tobacco retail density were computed. Individual level analysis suggested that Vietnamese American men had greater intention to quit smoking (OR = 2.90 CI = 1.59, 5.26) in comparison to Chinese Americans. However, after adding neighborhood level factors to the model, no ethnic group difference was observed. Neighborhood household median income (OR = 0.74, CI = 0.64, 0.86) and tobacco retail counts (OR = 0.79, CI = 0.67, 0.94) were negatively associated with intention to quit. Years lived in the U.S. was the only individual level factor associated with intention to quit. By comparing two Asian American groups that live in heterogeneous neighborhoods, we identify key environmental and policy drivers that are associated with quit intention. Future studies aimed at influencing individual-level behavior should take into consideration the neighborhood context and built environment characteristics.

Mental Illness Public Stigma and Generational Differences Among Vietnamese Americans.

Public stigma is one barrier to accessing behavioral health care among Vietnamese Americans. To explore and identify features of culture and acculturation that influence behavioral health-related stigma, six focus groups were conducted with Vietnamese American participants in three generational groups and eleven key informant interviews were conducted with Vietnamese community leaders, traditional healers, and behavioral health professionals. Data were analyzed using Link and Phelan's (Annu Rev Sociol 27(1):363-385, 2001) work on stigma as an organizing theoretical framework. Findings underline several key cultural and generational factors that intersect to affect perceptions, beliefs, and stigma about mental health treatment. In particular, participants in the youngest groups highlighted that while they recognized the value of mental health services, they felt culturally limited in their access. This appeared to be closely related to intergenerational communication about mental health. The findings suggest avenues for further research as well as interventions to increase mental health treatment access and adherence.

Immigration history, lifestyle characteristics, and breast density in the Vietnamese American Women's Health Study: a cross-sectional analysis.

Breast density is an important risk factor for breast cancer and varies substantially across racial-ethnic groups. However, determinants of breast density in Vietnamese immigrants in the United States (US) have not been studied. We investigated whether reproductive factors, immigration history, and other demographic and lifestyle factors were associated with breast density in Vietnamese Americans. We collected information on demographics, immigration history, and other lifestyle factors and mammogram reports from a convenience sample of 380 Vietnamese American women in California aged 40 to 70years. Breast Imaging Reporting and Data System (BI-RADS) breast density was abstracted from mammogram reports. Multivariable logistic regression was used to investigate the association between lifestyle factors and having dense breasts (BI-RADS 3 or 4). All participants were born in Viet Nam and 82% had lived in the US for 10years or longer. Younger age, lower body mass index, nulliparity/lower number of deliveries, and longer US residence (or younger age at migration) were associated with having dense breasts. Compared to women who migrated at age 40 or later, the odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals for having dense breasts among women who migratedbetween the ages of 30 and 39 and before age 30 were 1.72 (0.96-3.07) and 2.48 (1.43-4.32), respectively. Longer US residence and younger age at migration were associated with greater breast density in Vietnamese American women. Identifying modifiable mediating factors to reduce lifestyle changes that adversely impact breast density in this traditionally low-risk population for breast cancer is warranted.

Remaking New Orleans: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity ed. by Thomas J. Adams and Matt Sakakeeny

Reviewed by: Remaking New Orleans: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity ed. by Thomas J. Adams and Matt Sakakeeny Eric Nost REMAKING NEW ORLEANS: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity. Thomas J. Adams and Matt Sakakeeny, editors. Duke University Press, Durham, NC, 2019. 368pp.; maps, illustrations, bibliog., and index. $28.95 paper (ISBN 978-1-4780-0287-1). On March 26, 2020, the United States overtook China and Italy as the center of COVID-19 crisis and New Orleans, Louisiana (NOLA) was named a hotspot, along with New York City (Reuters Staff 2020). COVID-19 was another “world’s worst” for the city to add to a list that included world’s “prison capital” (Louisiana as a whole) and world’s fastest sinking place (NPR 2012, Marshall 2013). NOLA was exceptional, an outlier compared to most of the rest of the country, requiring a NOLA-specific explanation. Some commentators were quick to blame the Mardi Gras festivities that had taken place a month earlier (Fieldstadt 2020). However, others following in NOLA’s robust tradition of lambasting parachute journalism instead highlighted the federal government’s failure to provide the city with public health guidance (Adelson 2020, Hirsch 2020). Perhaps the situation, though dire, was not so exceptional (as would be confirmed by later surges in Detroit and rural parishes surrounding NOLA, not to mention the city’s long history of confronting epidemics) and perhaps it was not really a product of New Orleans’s distinctively spirituous and celebratory culture (Aldhous and Singer-Vine 2020, Jervis et al. 2020). Adams and Sakakeeny’s Remaking New Orleans represents a remarkable collection of stories that strike at exactly these kinds of debates, through a range of essays on historical and contemporary topics written by scholars from literature studies to anthropology and political science. Topically, the volume enriches our historical geography of the city. It provides a roving review of everything from regional wrestling circuits of the 70s and 80s to mid-century gay bars, and more recently, Vietnamese Americans’ suburban farms. [End Page 279] It also aims to shift our approach to contemporary NOLA by changing what we ask of it: how is that authenticity came to be so crucial to how we view the city? In what ways is NOLA less an exception to – and more a part of or even a forerunner to – state, national, and international socio-cultural and socioeconomic trends? The volume will interest many readers of the Southeastern Geographer, including urban and historical geographers fascinated by the city itself (see O’Hare 2018 for a summary of the journal’s literature on NOLA and Louisiana). It will also interest cultural geographers who are generally concerned with authenticity and exceptionalism as particular kinds of discourses to deconstruct. Although geographers may not be represented in the volume, (i.e., Helen A. Regis, author of chapter 6, is an anthropologist from Louisiana State University), much of the content of the book should be interest to human geographers. The key concerns of the volume are inherently geographical, even if not described as such. Its motivating questions around authenticity and exceptionalism target two different spatial levels. First, remaking NOLA’s authenticity means looking towards the city itself. In a place that is politically determined to and financially dependent upon demonstrating its distinctiveness, volume contributors ask, who is it that gets to be authentic here? Who belongs and who does not? What cultural practices have come to count as traditional? As the “Producing Authenticity” section suggests, contributors’ take on this is less “let’s settle once and for all what is real New Orleans” and more “how is it that certain things have come to be described as true to city traditions? What are the social tensions that arise from this?” For instance, Nguyen in chapter ten shows us how Vietnamese Americans used their community gardening as a way to be taken seriously as authentic residents of the city before, during, and after Katrina; and Smith describes the history of the African-American-led Zulu krewe and its continued yet contested use of blackface in carnival parades in chapter four. The second geographical approach works in the opposite direction: from the city outward. The volume considers New Orleans’s...

The Past/Present Vietnam War

The Past/Present Vietnam War Roger Chapman (bio) GENE BASSETT'S VIETNAM SKETCHBOOK: A Cartoonist's Wartime Perspective. By Thom Rooke. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2015. LOOKING BACK ON THE VIETNAM WAR: Twenty-first Century Perspectives. Edited by Brenda M. Boyle and Jeehyun Lim. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2016. Because I'm still in SaigonStill in SaigonI am still in SaigonIn my mind —Dan Daley (but sung by the Charlie Daniels Band), "Still in Saigon" (1982)1 I had to coax Thang and Hau—and later, my other relatives in Vietnam—to reminisce about the war, which had become distant to them. They preferred to focus on the present … —Duong Van Mai, a Vietnamese American (1993)2 [End Page 19] The year 2025 will mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Fall of Saigon and by that time there may be nothing left to say about the Vietnam War. Piles of books have been published on this conflict. As Thom Rooke explains in the preface of Gene Bassett's Vietnam Sketchbook, the books (as well as articles) written about Vietnam "are enough … to fill a C-130 Hercules transport plane" (xi). He should have suggested the larger C-5 Galaxy, but his point is understood as he continues: "It seems that any lesson Vietnam can teach has, in some fashion, already been taught" (xii). Meanwhile, the longest American war is no longer the longest, as it was superseded by the "War on Terror" (specifically the "forever war" in Afghanistan, which in 2019 was in its eighteenth year).3 So lessons taught may have been lessons forgotten, though Heraclitus might say, "No nation ever steps in the same quagmire twice, for it's not the same quagmire. …" It would seem that the events following September 11 would relegate the Vietnam War to the dustbin of academic inquiry, but according to editors Brenda M. Boyle and Jeehyun Lim, in the preface of their anthology Looking Back on the Vietnam War, "renewed academic conversations on the legacies of the Vietnam War … have emerged with the opening of previously inaccessible archives and the comparisons drawn between the Vietnam and Iraq wars" (5). Why that "old crazy Asian war"—to borrow from a classic country hit by Kenny Rogers—has long been a fixation of American culture, including academic inquiry, is a question yet to be definitively answered.4 Rooke's interest in Vietnam turned out to be happenstance. He befriended an older man, Gene Bassett, who in 1965 spent several months in Vietnam as an editorial cartoonist for Scripps Howard News Service. One day Bassett casually shared with Rooke about his seventy or eighty sketches he did while touring Vietnam and Rooke got inspired to put together a book. Rooke attended the University of Michigan, the birthplace of the antiwar Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), but he was of the class of 1978, the first "post-draft" class (xii). He feels that because he was younger, he "was left with a relatively unbiased perspective" (xi). Probably this is less the case than he realizes, considering that his tabulation of "consequences" of the war includes American war dead (60,000) and American wounded (300,000) while offering no tally of the fatalities and casualties of the other side. The volume by Boyle and Lim, however, turns attention to the lasting impact "on ordinary people" (5) or "the people who experienced the Cold War as a balance of terror" (6). Bassett's sketches, it can be noted, do at least include some imagery of the Vietnamese. The chapters offered by Boyle and Lim tend to be heavily focused on the Vietnamese diaspora. In actuality, these two quite different works are emblematic of the approach taken in remembering the Vietnam War. Rooke is focused on the war from an American perspective and seeks to preserve a body of memory—the Bassett sketches are primary documents and represent a reproduction of a type of archival material. Boyle and Lim, on the other hand, narrow "ordinary people" to generally exclude American GIs while seeking to remember the war from the vantage point [End Page 20] of Vietnamese in the years of aftermath. When the...

Editor’s Preface

Editor’s Preface Rick Bonus Our first essay in this issue, on the experiences of Arabs/Muslims as “censusless” in U.S. society, opens a conversation about what it means for a group to be considered outsiders by a state or a community. For Loubna Qutami, who writes about the racial classification of Arab Americans in official counts and social discourse, this status is perplexing and paradoxical, reflecting both the targeting of Arabs as suspect subjects especially in the aftermath of 9/11 as well as their continuing designation as “white” in census data. To be sure, Arab “whiteness”—what Qutami calls racial invisibilization—has a tendency to obscure the violence of racisms against these populations while depriving them of their right to self-determination. These are challenging conditions to be in, most remarkably because claiming due recognition in order to arrive at inclusion often leads to greater state surveillance in the service of violent exclusion. Is there any way to escape the double-edginess of exclusionary practices and inclusionary attempts? The answer may prove to be impossible, although referencing what has been done in a moment of legalized Asian exclusion from the 1900s to the 1920s might offer some viable insights. Found in our second essay, “Orientalism and the Orator,” Swati Rana carefully parses the autobiographical work of Dhan Gopal Mukerji, aptly titled Caste and Outcast, to highlight his role as a “soapbox orator” in subverting Orientalist constructs—itself a model for undermining the polarities of East and West. The process of disrupting Orientalism here is ingenious, in Rana’s reading, for it entails the deployment of rhetorical skills in “asserting” then “undoing” and in “exposing” then “undermining.” [End Page v] Fast-forward to the present, and we get a distilled variety of such a strategy of in-and-out intervention in “‘Outsiders No More?’ The Discourse of Political Incorporation of Vietnamese Refugees in the United States (1975–2020).” Here is a fresh take, through a study by Ly Thi Hai Tran, on the realities of boundary making from the perspective of a minority group. It is notable that the essay’s title is in question form, a telling reminder of the vagaries of policing the constitution and edges of any group that seeks to define who is and is not a part of it. Tran is careful not to make an impression that formal representation in conventional politicking, something that many believe Vietnamese Americans have attained already, is the culminating story here. Group interests will remain disputed within and outside of affinities as long as uneven relationships of power exist. We get that similar sense of the ebbs and flows of exclusion/inclusion within social fields of domination and resistance in Meredith Oda’s piece, “’Kikkoman, USA’: The Economic and Residential Integration of Japanese Americans and Japanese Foods.” Narrating a history of fascination with Japanese cuisine in the 1950s and 1960s, Oda is right on cue in considering “outsider” as a status that cannot simply be overturned by inclusion. Otherwise, this formula may just as well be followed with certainty. Interest and access to Japanese foods were indeed made possible through the efforts of key importers, restaurateurs, and opinion leaders. But the mainstreaming of Japanese food cultures, as Oda argues, depended on quite a narrow range of acceptance that emphasized rather than erased the status of Japanese Americans as forever foreigners. In all of these essays, we are reminded of the pains of exclusion. At the same time, we are also encouraged to consider some ways in which adversity can also generate innovative resistance, whether it be through self-generated information campaigns proposed by Qutami or by way of autobiographic troping as interpolated by Rana, representation and recognition as reported by Tran and gastronomic interventions as historicized by Oda. Such an out-of-placeness can have the capacity to produce transformative agency. And quite coincidentally, it is also a fitting refrain that strings together the essays in our reviews section that regard the lives of American Muslim women, the “unnamable” feature of Asian American art, a politics of intraracial desire, an environmental history of Japanese American incarceration, and speculative fiction in relationship to speculative finance. During such a...

Paris and the Marginalized Author: Treachery, Alienation, Queerness, and Exile ed. by Valérie K. Orlando and Pamela A. Pears

Reviewed by: Paris and the Marginalized Author: Treachery, Alienation, Queerness, and Exile ed. by Valérie K. Orlando and Pamela A. Pears Stephanie Schechner Orlando, Valérie K., and Pamela A. Pears, eds. Paris and the Marginalized Author: Treachery, Alienation, Queerness, and Exile. Lexington, 2019. ISBN 978-1-4985-6703-9. Pp. xix + 214. The chronological and international scope of this excellent book of essays is ambitious, gathering analyses of works by authors from across most of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and the globe. By choosing to center the volume on Paris, the editors offer what turns out to be an illusory focus in that the city functions only as a transitory point of passage, not a fixed place. For the authors discussed here, Paris is just as often a place to lose oneself as to find oneself. Many scholars have taken up the theme of exile in recent years, but this set of essays takes the reader a step further with the suggestion, made by several authors including Bernardo Toro in the interview that concludes this volume, that exile is the foundational state of all writing. Orlando and Pears have selected essays that complicate the notion of exile by expanding it to include self-exile, linguistic exile, and sexual exile among others. By not limiting exile to issues of nationality, race, or ethnicity, the editors consciously draw the reader's attention to questions of intersectionality. The editors broach this concern in the introduction, but the full impact of their choices only becomes clear as one reads the entire book, which contains essays on a diverse set of authors ranging from the more familiar like Richard Wright and James Baldwin, to lesser-known such as Elena Garro (Mexico) and Évelyne Trouillot (Haiti). One of the best essays is Alison Rice's complex study of the correspondence between Nancy Huston and Leïla Sebbar, two writers who resist interpretation and yet who yield fascinating insights on the question of what it means to be an outsider. Leslie Barnes's insightful analysis of Linda Lê's fiction is complemented by personal reflections on her own wanderings in Paris. Karl Ashoka Britto makes a compelling case for the inclusion of Vietnamese American authors Monique Truong and Aimee Phan, in his persuasive essay on Vietnamese diasporic fiction. Britto's essay draws connections between the French colonial and American postcolonial presence in Asia and subverts the reader's expectations of Vietnamese diasporic fiction. The volume concludes with two essays that allow the voices of writers to speak more directly either through summarized or transcribed interviews. The [End Page 257] reflections of these two authors, Louis-Philippe Dalembert (Haiti), and Bernardo Toro (Chile), close the book in a manner that highlights its far-reaching conclusions about not only the literature of exile but also literature as exile. Stephanie Schechner Widener University (PA) Copyright © 2020 American Association of Teachers of French

A Pilot Biomonitoring Study of Cumulative Phthalates Exposure among Vietnamese American Nail Salon Workers.

Many California nail salon workers are low-income Vietnamese women of reproductive age who use nail products daily that contain androgen-disrupting phthalates, which may increase risk of male reproductive tract abnormalities during pregnancy. Yet, few studies have characterized phthalate exposures among this workforce. To characterize individual metabolites and cumulative phthalates exposure among a potentially vulnerable occupational group of nail salon workers, we collected 17 post-shift urine samples from Vietnamese workers at six San Francisco Bay Area nail salons in 2011, which were analyzed for four primary phthalate metabolites: mono-n-butyl-, mono-isobutyl-, mono(2-Ethylhexyl)-, and monoethyl phthalates (MnBP, MiBP, MEHP, and MEP, respectively; μg/L). Phthalate metabolite concentrations and a potency-weighted sum of parent compound daily intake (Σandrogen-disruptor, μg/kg/day) were compared to 203 Asian Americans from the 2011–2012 National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey (NHANES) using Student’s t-test and Wilcoxin signed rank test. Creatinine-corrected MnBP, MiBP, MEHP (μg/g), and cumulative phthalates exposure (Σandrogen-disruptor, μg/kg/day) levels were 2.9 (p < 0.0001), 1.6 (p = 0.015), 2.6 (p < 0.0001), and 2.0 (p < 0.0001) times higher, respectively, in our nail salon worker population compared to NHANES Asian Americans. Levels exceeded the NHANES 95th or 75th percentiles among some workers. This pilot study suggests that nail salon workers are disproportionately exposed to multiple phthalates, a finding that warrants further investigation to assess their potential health significance.

Citizen-Science and Participatory Research as a Means to Improve Stakeholder Engagement in Resource Management: A Case Study of Vietnamese American Fishers on the US Gulf Coast.

This study examines the engagement of Vietnamese American commercial fisheries stakeholders in the US Gulf Coast with state and federal agencies and the role that citizen science and participatory research may play in improving this engagement. Using a mixed methods study including surveys, interviews, and focus groups, findings highlight language, lack of trust, and outreach misfit as key barriers to engaging Vietnamese American stakeholders as demanded for collaborative resource management or co-management. However, findings also demonstrate the potential role for citizen science and participatory research that collaboratively engages stakeholders in research to overcome some of these barriers to engaging diverse fishing stakeholders.

The process to rapprochement between Vietnam and its diaspora in the United States

ABSTRACTDespite the lingering conflict between the government of Vietnam and the Vietnamese diaspora in the United States, issues of remittance and relationship relaxation between the refugees and Vietnamese government happened both in the 1990s. Recent years have seen the attitude-change of the returning diaspora and their shifting strategies of working in Vietnam. This paper describes the first step toward rapprochement between Vietnam and its diaspora in the United States, by analysing the attempts of Vietnam to approach its diaspora in the United States and the reactions of the diasporic community members. On the other hand, it also describes the efforts of Vietnamese Americans to empower Vietnamese people through philanthropic and civic engagement activities. The rapprochement via media and civic engagement reveals a shift from hard, intense ideological conflict to soft tactics in the transnational relation between Vietnam and the Vietnamese diaspora in the United States. This paper concludes that the process to rapprochement is still challenged by the significant differences in political views between the two sides. It suggests that the process of negotiation and conflict resolution be conducted with openness, honesty and acceptance of differences.

Effect of a media intervention on hepatitis B screening among Vietnamese Americans

ABSTRACT Objective: There is a lack of controlled studies of community-wide interventions to increase screening for hepatitis B (HBV) among Asian Americans, particularly Vietnamese Americans, who disproportionately suffer from HBV-related illnesses. The objective of our study was to develop, implement, and evaluate the effectiveness of a media campaign to promote HBV screening among Vietnamese Americans. Design: We designed and implemented a three-year media campaign promoting HBV screening among Vietnamese Americans. Evaluation consisted of cross-sectional pre- and post-intervention population-based telephone surveys of Vietnamese Americans adults age 18–64 who spoke English or Vietnamese and lived in the Northern California (intervention) or Greater Washington, D.C. (comparison) communities in 2007 or 2011. Statistical analysis was completed in 2012. The main outcome was self-report of HBV testing, defined as participants answering ‘Yes’ to the question: ‘Have you ever had a blood test to check for hepatitis B?’ Results: The sample sizes at pre- and post-intervention were 1,704 and 1,666, respectively. Both communities reported increased exposure to HBV-related booklets, radio and television advertisements, and websites. Only the intervention community reported increased exposure to newspaper elements. HBV screening increased in both communities (intervention: 65.3% to 73.1%, p < 0.01, comparison: 57.7% to 66.0%, p < 0.01). In multivariable analyses, there was no intervention effect. In both communities, exposure to media elements (Odds Ratio 1.26 [95% Confidence Interval: 1.21, 1.31] for each additional element) was significantly associated with screening. Conclusions: Among Vietnamese Americans in 2 large communities, HBV screening rates were sub-optimal. Screening increased in both the intensive media intervention and comparison communities, and exposure to HBV-related media messages was associated with increased screening. Efforts to address HBV screening among Vietnamese Americans should include mass media messaging.

Serious quit attempts and cessation implications for Asian American male smokers

IntroductionSmoking prevalence remains high among Asian American immigrant men, particularly those with limited English proficiency. Understanding ways to promote serious quit attempts (defined as a quit attempt lasting at least 24 h) could be crucial for reducing tobacco-related health disparities in this population. This study examines correlates of serious past year quit attempts among Chinese and Vietnamese American male daily smokers. MethodsBaseline survey data were collected between 2015 and 2017 from a lifestyle intervention trial (N = 340 Chinese and Vietnamese male daily smokers). Data analysis was conducted in 2019. Multivariable logistic regression analysis was used to identify factors associated with serious past year quit attempts. ResultsLess than half (43.2%) of the study participants had at least one serious past year quit attempt. Significant correlates of serious quit attempts included utilizing evidence-based methods (OR = 12.83, 95% CI 5.17–31.84) or other methods (OR = 3.92, 95% CI 3.92–13.73) to facilitate quitting compared to those who did not attempt to quit. Also, participants who had a physician encounter in the past year were more likely to have had a serious quit attempt (OR = 2.25, 95% CI 1.12–4.53). Discussing smoking during a past year doctor's visit, however, was not a significant correlate of serious quit attempts. ConclusionsOur findings underscore the importance of promoting the use of smoking cessation resources, and potentially utilizing healthcare encounters to facilitate cessation. Investigations are warranted to understand better how patient-physician interactions can enhance smoking cessation.

Vietnamese American Dementia Caregivers' Perceptions and Experiences of a Culturally Tailored, Evidence-Based Program to Reduce Stress and Depression.

Vietnamese American dementia caregivers are at increased risk for adverse mental health compared to the general U.S. population given their sociodemographic and immigration experiences, yet programs that address their needs are lacking. The current article describes Vietnamese American dementia caregivers' perceptions and experiences of a culturally tailored, evidence-based intervention to reduce stress and depression. A convenience sample of caregivers was recruited from the San Francisco Bay area and randomly assigned to intervention ("Our Family Journey"; OFJ) (n = 30) or control (written dementia caregiving information) (n = 30) groups. All intervention and 76.7% of control caregivers reported that the OFJ or educational materials, respectively, were very/somewhat helpful. Three or more skills were refined/learned by 96.7% of OFJ and 36.6% of control participants. Qualitative findings indicated that the intervention had positive effects on well-being and taught new caregiving skills. This first U.S. study to address the mental health needs of Vietnamese American dementia caregivers shows positive perceptions/experiences and demonstrates a model to address a significant need in the community. [Journal of Gerontological Nursing, 45(9), 39-50.].

Insight into hepatitis B prevalence and risk factors among Vietnamese Americans: a cross-sectional analysis of data from a community-based screening program

ObjectivesThe aims of our study were to describe current hepatitis B prevalence among Vietnamese Americans and to examine predictors of hepatitis B risk in this specific ethnic community.DesignCross-sectional analysis of...

Cultural variation in temporal associations among somatic complaints, anxiety, and depressive symptoms in adolescence

ObjectiveDifferent domains of internalizing symptoms (somatic, anxiety, depressive) often occur concurrently, suggesting that they may share common etiology. In longitudinal analyses of internalizing among youth, anxiety is often found to precede depression. However, relatively few studies have also assessed how somatic problems, the third symptom domain, are involved in longitudinal patterns of internalizing. In addition, temporal relations among internalizing symptom domains may vary by cultural group as somatic symptoms are posited to be a more culturally-normative way of communicating or experiencing distress in non-Western, interdependent cultures. Thus, the present study examined longitudinal relations among these three internalizing symptom domains in three ethnocultural adolescent samples. Methods304 European American, 420 Vietnamese American, and 717 Vietnamese adolescents' self-reported internalizing symptoms (somatic, anxiety, depressive) were assessed at three time points, spaced three months apart, using multigroup cross-lagged path analysis. ResultsAnxiety symptoms consistently predicted increases in depressive symptoms in European American adolescents. In contrast, for Vietnamese and Vietnamese American adolescents, the most consistent relation was with somatic complaints predicting increases in anxiety. Anxiety and depressive symptoms bidirectionally predicted each other among the Vietnamese and Vietnamese American adolescents. ConclusionsCultural group differences were evident in the temporal course of internalizing symptoms. The pattern of results have implications for culturally relevant intervention targets, during a developmental period of risk for internalizing disorders.

Forum on teaching Asian religions in the American South

AbstractThis series of three essays by educators from Georgia, Texas, and Alabama examines teaching Asian Religions in the American South. Through reflection on individual experience, each essay offers concrete strategies for the classroom that can be utilized by fellow educators working in the American South, but can also inform pedagogy in other North American regions. Introducing the idea of the “imagined student,” Esaki discusses teaching African American students and tailoring Asian religions courses towards their interests by producing positive buy‐in, while also acknowledging their potential isolation from White peers interested in similar topics. Mikles builds on Esaki's idea of the imagined student to discuss her own experience teaching Mexican and Vietnamese American students in Texas, while presenting specific strategies to overcome preconceived educator bias about students in Southern classrooms. Battaglia closes out the series by suggesting the use of a phenomenological approach for students to sympathetically enter into an Asian religious worldview. She offers specific exercises that can help students unpack their own assumptions – their “invisible backpack” – and approach Asian religions on their own terms.

Creating sound in silences: the Second Wave podcast and pluralizing Vietnamese diasporic histories

ABSTRACTDebuting in the fall of 2017, the Second Wave podcast follows host Thanh Tan as she explores the experiences and challenges of U.S.-born Vietnamese Americans. Similar to many children of Vietnamese refugees, Tan’s knowledge of Vietnam and her family’s history contains gaps of silences created by trauma, which are often filled by non-Vietnamese American voices and pop culture. Through engaging these gaps, Second Wave aims to create sound among diasporic silences to challenge dominant narratives about Vietnamese Americans. While the podcast has several limitations due to its narrative format, Second Wave ultimately pluralizes historical narratives of Vietnamese diasporas, opening spaces for Vietnamese diasporic subjects to discuss their families’ refugee experiences. In doing so, Second Wave is a step towards encouraging quieted voices to speak up and ask questions that continue to disrupt singular narratives of the Vietnam War and its’ aftermath.

Study on improvement of design method for airport flexible pavement in Vietnam

Presently, there are 22 airports in operation comprising of 9 international airports and 13 domestic airports in Vietnam. According to the master plan of airports national wide, there are 124 airports and aerodromes both civil airports and military airfield. Design of airport flexible pavement is an important step during design the airport runway and taxi. Currently airport flexible pavement in Vietnam designs based on Vietnamese national standards, American standards and Russian standards. However, these standards have some issues such as design load, effect depth of the aircraft load, relative deflection caused by the aircraft and critical relative deflection. Therefore, this research points out improper issues that is not compatible with current practices of increase in airplane total weight. It also clarifies unfavorable effects of existing flexible pavement design method to the performance of runway pavement in some airports in Vietnam. Some technical measures are proposed for improvement of the current flexible pavement design standards and specifications are also recommended.

Revising Ho Chi Minh: Diasporic Historical Fiction in The Book of Salt and The Zenith

Abstract Through a reading of Vietnamese American author Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt (2003) and Parisian writer-in-exile Duong Thu Huong’s The Zenith (2012), this essay examines the ways in which the two diasporic Vietnamese novels revise modern Vietnam’s founding father Ho Chi Minh and thereby challenge the Communist Party’s official historiography. Resisting both the lingering civil war’s Manichaeanism and the militant anti-Communism of the diaspora, the texts present Ho as a figure of hope through which to imagine national reunification and an alternative future for Vietnam.

“Living happily despite having an illness”: Perceptions of healthy aging among Korean American, Vietnamese American, and Latino older adults

Background/objectiveThe growingly diverse aging population presents a challenge for the geriatric workforce, particularly its capacity to effectively respond to the sociocultural and linguistic needs of ethnic minority older adults. Informed by research on the importance of culturally-competent care in reducing racial and ethnic health disparities, this study sought to understand the meaning of healthy aging from the perspectives of Korean American, Vietnamese American, and Latino older adults. MethodsInterviews were conducted with 30 participants recruited from community-based organizations in Southern California. ResultsSeveral dimensions emerged in the participants' understanding of healthy aging: (1) having good physical and mental health (2) optimism and acceptance; (3) social connectedness; (4) taking charge of one's health; and (5) independence and self-worth. ConclusionsResults could inform the development of a culturally-responsive geriatric healthcare system that takes into account older adults' beliefs, preferences, and needs to promote successful aging.