migration – Canh Than

MEMORABLE MUSIC: PHẠM’ DUY’S “RIDDLES” (“ĐỐ AI”), TRACK 17 ON SAIGON ROCK & SOUL

June 28, 2024 / heritage / Folk music, French colonialism, memorable music series, migration, music, Phạm Duy, Phương Dung, Resistance War/First Indochina War, romantic love, RVN (South Vietnam), Saigon Rock & Soul CD, youth

Phạm Duy’s “Riddles” (“Đố ai,” 1954?) is a charming song that mixes tradition and modernity. It is the last track on Saigon Rock & Soul, and this post will probably be my last one in my series-within-a-series translating the lyrics of songs from that CD. “Riddles” exemplifies a Vietnamese musical genre known as “new folk […]

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MEMORABLE MUSIC, TẾT EDITION: MIGRATION AND NOSTALGIA IN PHẠM ĐÌNH CHƯƠNG’S “SPRINGTIME IN EXILE” (“XUÂN THA HƯƠNG”)

February 10, 2024 / heritage / Duy Trác, holidays, memorable music series, migration, migration of 1954, music, partition, Phạm Đình Chương, RVN (South Vietnam), Tết, translation

Happy New Year! Chúc mừng năm mới! One of the holiday songs I remember my family listening to at Tết when I was a teenager was Phạm Đình Chương’s “Springtime in Exile” (“Xuân tha hương,” 1956). Tết, or the lunar new year, is the most important holiday of the year for most ethnic Vietnamese, regardless

MEMORABLE MUSIC, TẾT EDITION: MIGRATION AND NOSTALGIA IN PHẠM ĐÌNH CHƯƠNG’S “SPRINGTIME IN EXILE” (“XUÂN THA HƯƠNG”) Read More »

WHAT DOES CHRISTMAS MEAN TO A VIETNAMESE BUDDHIST REFUGEE?

December 23, 2023 / heritage / Christmas, French colonialism, holidays, middle class, migration, refugees, RVN (South Vietnam), Saigon

“Vietnamese people love Christmas!” That’s what I usually say when someone asks me whether I celebrate the holiday, and I try to explain why I am both a lifelong Buddhist and a Christmas enthusiast. But the real answer is a little more complicated. I was a baby when my family came to the US as

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FUN READS: MIGRATION AND DISLOCATION IN BÌNH NGUYÊN LỘC’S THOROUGHFARE (ĐÒ DỌC)

November 24, 2023 / heritage, research / Bình Nguyên Lộc, courtship, fun reads, literature, marriage, migration, novels, romantic love, RVN (South Vietnam), southern regionalism

Bình Nguyên Lộc’s Thoroughfare (Đò dọc, 1959) is a charming novel about migration and dislocation in southern Vietnam in the mid-1950s. Nam Thành and his wife are originally from a village in Bạc Liêu province in the Mekong delta, but they flee with their daughters to Saigon during the early years of the Resistance War

FUN READS: MIGRATION AND DISLOCATION IN BÌNH NGUYÊN LỘC’S THOROUGHFARE (ĐÒ DỌC) Read More »