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Vietnamese Culture Links on the Internet
This page will be in English until I can learn how to create a page with the DAU marks.
Cultural Gems Discovered on the Internet
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Ca Dao - |
Vietnamese News and Entertainment sites
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Vietnamese Educational sites
ONLINE DICTIONARIES
Shopping
Public Message Forums
Culture is not just ancient tradition. Culture is the spiritual, intellectual and emotional features of a society. Culture lives and evolves.
Since April 1975, nearly 3 million people have left Vietnam. They have settled on five different continents. Almost half of them ended up in North America. The largest portion of that population made their homes in California.
The traditions that strongly emphasized discipline, respect and education, led many of them and their children to chose the sciences as a way to enter the American middle class. In the mid-80s, many of Vietnamese students were studying electrical engineering and computer science. These students have since graduated and have gone from being citizens and descendants of a poor agrarian based society, to becoming important players in the Information Age, and are now asserting their cultural identity through the Internet.
The Internet is rich with many cultural resources. I’ve discovered web pages about the Vietnamese folk poetry, Ca Dao. There are recordings of regular people singing their favorite folk tunes on the web, as well as pages with dozens of Ca Dao poems to read. There are numerous other sites that offer music, poetry, art and humor.
There are also news and entertainment sites. They offer the news in the Vietnamese language, frequently featuring topics of particular interest to the Vietnamese community. Entertainment sites offer the latest in music, movie and show business news.
The educational sites I found most interesting were those that helped my effort to learn the Vietnamese language. These include several English-Vietnamese dictionaries, as well as Lessons and Tutorials for learning to speak Vietnamese. There were children’s educational sites, and ESL sites as well.
The Internet also provides online shopping for the Vietnamese community. Popular food, clothing, cosmetic and entertainment values are available for a few mouse clicks, helping people to acquire items not available in the local economy.
Communication within the community on culture, politics and affairs of the heart as well as other interests are available in public forums, where individuals can post messages and participate in discussion of interest to them.
Even though many Vietnamese people are far from the birthplace of their traditions, the Internet offers them a chance to preserve and participate in their cultural heritage.