How important is Vietnamese in your household?

In America almost all children of Vietnamese are illiterate in the language.  I find this very sad.  It was shocking to me when my teacher in the USA told me that even as limited as my vocabulary was then I already wrote Vietnamese better than almost any ABV. 

But I can't learn and retain a language without writing it.

I think growing up multilingual is fantastic.  But not as an illiterate,

My mother-in-law always spoke Vnese with her children no matter what and as a result her children are all fluent in it. Meanwhile her friends spoke what English they knew and their children speak Vnese that's barely passable. I've done a lot of research on raising multilingual children and the key to fluency seems to be speaking the minority language at home, no exceptions. So I wonder if any here disagree with this and speak Vnese?

Vietnamese kids in the US can understand Vietnamese on average but writing/reading is non-existent.   it doesnt matter how much you speak to them until they want to learn Vietnamese nothing you teach will stick.   i didnt want to learn the language until i was much older.  older Viets always lament the fact that younger Viets forgot their mother language.  i always counter how can you forget something you were never taught.

My experience in the U.S. is that all Vietnamese born to two Vietnamese parents speak and understand Vietnamese, though to a more limited degree than if raised in Vietnam. All the American-born Vietnamese who married Vietnamese immigrants or took spouses in Vietnam went through a language re-learning experience upon settling down with the new spouse. THis includes people born in Ohio (married a girl from Camau) and Nebraska (married a girl from Saigon) as well as those born within Viet-American enclaves.

Vietnamese-American children born to a non-Vietnamese parent often fit the profile mentioned by others, i.e. a very limited knowledge of Vietnamese. Of interest, girls to such families usually go to college while the boys do not.

The most important language for anyone born in the U.S. to master is English. Ethnic and cultural pride should always come second to pride in the U.S. If anyone's land of ancestry had been better, their ancestors would have stayed there.

Speaking as someone who was born to Vietnamese parents outside of Vietnam I am able to speak Vietnamese although my reading and writing is very limited.

Why?
Because I never learned it. I studied writing and reading by myself over friends (MSN Live Messenger yeah!). There are Vietnamese schools where you can send your kids to learn Vietnamese but unfortunately there is no one in my region.

My parents only speak Vietnamese to me. I grew up bilingual and really appreciate it. Now I go back to Vietnam and can communicate with my relatives although my Vietnamese isn't fluent.

I suggest to speak only your native language at home so your children will be exposed to it. They learn to listen, to understand and to speak it. This has ONLY advantages.

German, English or any other foreign language will be taught at school, so don't worry about it.

Another fact is when a kid speaks two or more languages from the beginning it will find learning other languages easily.

By the age of 11 I spoke German, Vietnamese and English on a good Level. Now, at the age of 20 something I speak 5 languages and still study for new languages (Japanese, Korean).

In America almost all Vietnamese children speak both English and Vietnamese. For that matter, almost all first generation Americans tend to speak both English and their parents native tongue.

With me having a child, it definitely is a topic that is on my mind often. If we were to go back to US, my child would most likely not learn Vietnamese. The odds would be against him with American parents and only one set of grandparents that speak Vietnamese. Even they know English from being in US for over 30 years. If that were to happen, I would send my child to Chinese school, like my husband. For us, Vietnamese is not important in our household, but knowing more than one language is.

Nina , sorry to ask this, but you are not Vietnamese, or American Vietnamese who don't speak Vietnamese?

As only one set of your side speaks Vietnamese please do yourself a favour and try to let it learn another language besides English.

I have met so many Americans, Australians, British people who never learned another language because simply it wasn't necessary.

Since I'm fluent in many languages I have the chance to travel to many countries and also work there. Did you know that the demand for multilingual professionals is highly risen in Asia?

I was offered at least a handful of jobs because I spoke German and Chinese.

Imagine what a future your child could have with many languages?

missmae wrote:

Nina , sorry to ask this, but you are not Vietnamese, or American Vietnamese who don't speak Vietnamese?

As only one set of your side speaks Vietnamese please do yourself a favour and try to let it learn another language besides English.

I have met so many Americans, Australians, British people who never learned another language because simply it wasn't necessary.

Since I'm fluent in many languages I have the chance to travel to many countries and also work there. Did you know that the demand for multilingual professionals is highly risen in Asia?

I was offered at least a handful of jobs because I spoke German and Chinese.

Imagine what a future your child could have with many languages?

I am bilingual and know some conversational bits of two languages, my husband speaks three and conversational of one. Vietnamese is on his side but there seems to be little desire of retaining Vietnamese language or heritage from his side. We live in Vn so I do wonder how well my child's Vnese will be with such little desire for anybody to teach him. I would think it would not be possible to NOT speak it here but I do wonder.

If you decide to leave her long - term, at least until your child goes to school, it should be fine with its Vietnamese (when u send it to a local Vietnamese School which I highly recommend since those schools have so many brainies ... so jealous of their knowledge).

Vietnamese is such an interesting language and we tend to forget this nowadays. It's my mother language and I'm glad I grew up with so many languages

The problem we have is not whether or not my children speak Vietnamese or not, it's what dialect or accent they will use.
My wife speaks with a southern accent and my mother in law and housekeeper speak with a middle/north accent. My son is 3 and my wife says he is already starting to use a different voice depending on who he is talking to. He is learning English from me but he is not very good with it yet.

VungTauDon wrote:

The problem we have is not whether or not my children speak Vietnamese or not, it's what dialect or accent they will use.
My wife speaks with a southern accent and my mother in law and housekeeper speak with a middle/north accent. My son is 3 and my wife says he is already starting to use a different voice depending on who he is talking to. He is learning English from me but he is not very good with it yet.

Why does you wife have a different dialect than her mom?

Honestly I would stick to Southern Dialect because you are based in South going Central Vietnam right? Your child probably will seldom travel or live in Hanoi since everybody goes to HCMC.There are the school, the businesses and the night life.

Southern Dialect imo is more appropriate. I speak strong Southern Dialect since my mom is from HCMC and my Dad's side speaks Northern Dialect but mixed with Sout since they lived here for a long time. My only problem is that I don't understand the Northern One. It sounds quite snobbish to me:)

My wife is from Dong Ha but adopted a more southern accent when she started university in HCMC. She said that people looked down on her because she spoke like a country girl. Now the only time I hear her talk different is when she meets someone from her home town.
Her mom and our housekeeper are from a little further north and retained their northern accents.

Ah I see.
You should'nt worry too much about the dialect. Your kid will likely to adapt to the dialect of its surrounding. Best way is to keep to its mom dialect.

I remember adapting to British English when I lived there but strangely took over Canadian English when I spend some months over there and lately talking to my Toronto Friends here in Vietnam.

For our family, Vietnamese and Chinese (more so Vietnamese) is quite important and is the main language of communication. My thought is that our daughters will eventually return to Melbourne for their education and will be taught and exposed to English more in their later years, so why not teach them Viet. now and encourage them to keep it up in the future. For me and most of my Viet-Aust friends back home, our parents spoke to us in Viet. at home and we attended weekend classes to learn to how to read/write Vietnamese.