During her trip to Hanoi to attend the Fourth International Conference on Vietnamese Studies, Professor Quyen Di Chuc Bui (University of California, Los Angeles and California State University, Long Beach) accepted an invitation to give a presentation at the Department of Vietnamese Studies and Vietnamese Language on the morning of November 29, 2012. The topic of the presentation was "Orientation of Vietnamese Studies Training in the United States".This was the Faculty's second scientific seminar of the 2012-2013 academic year. Many faculty members, collaborators, some retired teachers, and international students attended the presentation. For two hours, Professor Quyen Di presented a fairly comprehensive overview of institutions offering Vietnamese Studies and Vietnamese language programs, noting that the University of California, Los Angeles, has a popular Vietnamese Studies program. Professor Quyen Di mentioned that several universities in the United States teach Vietnamese Studies, and there are Vietnamese language classes at Harvard, the UC (University of California), Yale, Cornell, and other Vietnamese language centers. For example, in California alone, there are over 100 centers, located in churches, temples, community organizations, and community colleges. Southern California has over 15,000 Vietnamese students and approximately 1,500 volunteer teachers.
Professor Quyen Di also stated that there is actually no separate major for Vietnamese Studies in the United States, only majors in Southeast Asian Studies (which includes Vietnamese Studies). However, UCLA has a larger-scale Vietnamese Studies program than other majors, designed to broaden students' understanding and focus on the languages, cultures, and societies of Southeast Asia (Thailand, Cambodia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, East Timor, etc.). Regarding the student population in the United States, there are two groups of students: those of Vietnamese descent (heritage students) and those who are not of Vietnamese descent (non-heritage students). There are also some mixed classes, and the professor admitted that teaching mixed classes is very difficult due to the differing levels of Vietnamese proficiency.
The advanced Vietnamese Literature class studies Vietnamese literature (divided into three areas: oral literature, literature written in Chinese and Nom script, and literature written in the national script). Here, the professor selects famous Vietnamese works to teach: for example, short stories by Nguyen Huy Thiep, "The Sorrow of War" by Bao Ninh, "The Land of Many People and Many Ghosts" by Nguyen Khac Truong, "The Endless Field" by Nguyen Ngoc Tu... students are encouraged to research and interpret Vietnamese folk songs and proverbs, or even watch films and listen to songs. At the end of the course, there may be an assessment such as making a film based on an idea from a fairy tale like Tam Cam or inspired by folk songs like "Yesterday I was scooping water at the village well / I forgot my shirt on the lotus branch"... In this case, the screenwriter, actors, and director are all students, and the grading is based on many factors, including whether the pronunciation is clear.
