By Giselle Lee | Staff Writer
Following the fall of Saigon in 1975, survivors of the Vietnam War immigrated to America in search of a better life. After decades of carving out a home for themselves as refugees, the latest generation of Vietnamese American students hope to continue celebrating their parents’ legacy at Baylor.
According to a 2018 report by Baylor’s Institute of Oral History, North Texas is home to the fourth-largest Vietnamese community in the United States. Their complex integration into Texan society has been highlighted by their struggle for survival after the war and what it means to be both American and Vietnamese.
Sugarland senior Emily Nguyen said her identity as a second-generation immigrant has given her the opportunity to explore her upbringing in both cultures at Baylor.
“I’ve always tried to educate myself on Vietnamese culture,” Nguyen said. “I’m applying for a Fulbright in Vietnam, and I’m learning a lot about how the culture is in Vietnam now compared to what my parents lived in.”
Nguyen, the president of the Vietnamese Student Association, said cultural awareness is important on college campuses, but strives to make the learning process “approachable” for Baylor students through events such as VSA’s annual Autumn Moon celebration, held on Friday evening in the SUB Barfield Drawing Room.
“In my childhood, I celebrated Autumn Moon a lot, more so than when I became older,” Nguyen said. “We want events to not just be fun, but we want people to be able to learn about Vietnamese culture … I think that exposure is really helpful to get people to see our perspectives on different cultures.”
Autumn Moon, also known as Mid-Autumn Festival, is celebrated annually on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month in Vietnam. It is tied to the folklore legend of Chú Cuội, a man who flew to the moon clinging to a magical banyan tree, visible in the shadows of the full moon. It also places a heavy emphasis on children celebrating with traditions such as lantern making, mooncakes and lion dancing.
Baylor celebrated Autumn Mood through food, dances and students from all backgrounds coming together. Nguyen said it showed how a unified team with multiple identities helps the rest of the student body keep an open mind, especially when learning about different cultures.
Katy junior Collin Le echoed the sentiment.
“Being able to hold a sacred place for tradition is very important, and for you to keep it, I think it’s very meaningful to you and might change you in some way,” Le said. “The importance of Baylor giving to student organizations [the opportunity] to host festivals like Autumn Moon shows that VSA isn’t just an ethnicity or race group together, but that it’s a community in a sense that everyone is welcome.”
For Le, preserving his family’s cultural heritage was easy because his parents were “very stemmed” to family tradition; in their household, Vietnamese was the primary language of communication.
“Since my parents moved to America with a fresh start, I was able to see the highs and the lows,” Le said. “Me being here was really fortunate, but there’s always a new path for me, in a sense. [In terms of] my upbringing, I was able to understand how a person would think or feel more prevalently than others, because I was able to dip my toes into different like categories.”
Le said his parents heavily influenced his self-development as a second-generation immigrant.
“When I was young, my parents are very religious Buddhists,” Le said. “But as I grew older, they put their focus more on to me, so that helped me find my true identity more and have more time to focus on myself and be open-minded. Being able to celebrate or be appreciative for each tradition or religion from each place is important [to me].”
Beyond creating a sense of belonging for Vietnamese American students, celebrating different cultures has also enhanced the overall learning experience of Baylor students across campus.
Phoenix senior Rachel Thornton, who met Nguyen and other VSA officers during her freshman year, said her first introductions to Vietnamese culture came through traditional meals cooked by Nguyen’s family. She said these initial exposures led to her long-term support for VSA events.
“One of the things that has always stood out to me the most is community and how much they really care for each other,” Thornton said. “It’s not only taught me more about how important culture can be to bring people together, but also to share that with other people, and that makes the whole Baylor community stronger, and more aware of not only what’s going around with us, but also with other cultures and other people around the world.”
Thornton said diversity and cultural differences should not separate students and that Baylor can build “beautiful, long-lasting friendships” by learning from one another.
“We’re all products of our lived experiences, and that doesn’t need to be a bad thing,” Thornton said. “I think that embracing our culture while also teaching others about what it means to be one, and I think that’s really beautiful that both things can exist at once.”
Moving forward, while VSA has received overwhelming support from the Multicultural Affairs Office in promoting Vietnamese culture, Nguyen hopes multicultural student organizations will not be seen as a “diversity token” but as a community open to anyone at Baylor.
“I do wish more so on the Baylor side that they could help promote and even encourage students to go to these events,” Nguyen said. “The goal for me personally and for VSA is just making sure that we’re being recognized, not just because we’re Vietnamese but because we have something that’s spectacular for everyone to see and to experience.”
