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THE AMERICAN DREAM IN VIETNAMESE This page intentionally left blank THE AMERICAN DREAM IN VIETNAMESE Nhi T. Lieu University of Minnesota Press Minneapolis London The publication of this book has been aided by a College of Liberal Arts subvention grant awarded by the University of Texas at Austin. An earlier version of chapter 3 was published as “Remembering ‘The Nation’ through Pageantry: Femininity and the Politics of Vietnamese Womanhood in the H oa Hau Ao Dai Contest,” F rontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 21, no. 1 (2000): 127–51; reprinted with permission of the University of Nebraska Press; copyright 2000 by Frontiers Editorial Collective. An earlier version of chapter 4 appeared as “Performing Culture in Diaspora: Assimilation and Hybridity in P aris by Night Videos and Vietnamese American Niche Media,” in A lien Encounters: Popular Culture in Asian America , eds. Mimi Thi Nguyen and Thuy Linh Nguyen Tu, 194–220 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press); copyright 2007 by Duke University Press; all rights reserved; reprinted with permission. Copyright 2011 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Published by the University of Minnesota Press 111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290 Minneapolis, MN 55401-2520 http://www.upress.umn.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Lieu, Nhi T. The American Dream in Vietnamese / Nhi T. Lieu. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8166-6569-3 (hc : acid-free paper) – ISBN 978-0-8166-6570-9 (pb: acid-free paper) 1. Vietnamese Americans–Ethnic identity. 2. Vietnamese Americans–Cultural assimilation. 3. Popular culture–United States. 4. Popular culture–Vietnam. I. Title. E184.V53L54 2011 305.895922’073–dc22 2010032641 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper The University of Minnesota is an equal-opportunity educator and employer. 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 This book is dedicated to my family, the nucleus of my support system: my lifelong partner, Toan Leung; my parents, Mo Lieu and Nhung Truong; and my children, Sophie and Ethan. This page intentionally left blank Contents INTRODUCTION: Private Desires on Public Display ix 1. Assimilation and Ambivalence: Legacies of U.S. Military Intervention 1 2. Vietnamese by Other Means: The Overlapping Diasporas of Little Saigon 27 3. Pageantry and Nostalgia: Beauty Contests and the Gendered Homeland 59 4. Consuming Transcendent Media: Videos, Variety Shows, and the New Middle Class 79 CONCLUSION: Transnational Flows Between the Diaspora and the Homeland 115 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 135 NOTES 141 INDEX 171 This page intentionally left blank Introduction Private Desires on Public Display MORE THAN THREE DECADES have passed since the fall of Saigon, but the jarring words V iet Nam still haunt many Americans. Known as the unforgettable war lost by the United States, “Viet Nam” was not regarded by the popular media as a nation in its own right. Torn by political confl icts that unleashed massive confusion and tragedy upon its own people, the besieged country was seen as an unfathomable quagmire that divided the American nation and continues to resonate darkly in America’s historical memory, especially in light of our contemporary involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. For the Vietnamese refugees and immigrants who fl ed the war and their defeated nation, starting a new life elsewhere aff orded them countless opportunities as well as insurmountable challenges. From these bleak circumstances, they have constructed for themselves new ways to make sense of their experiences. Metropolitan settings and their surrounding suburbs throughout the world have become new places of resettlement for a signifi cant number of people who fl ed Vietnam during and since the fall of Saigon in 1975. Vibrant ethnic neighborhoods and communities thrive in global cities, serv- ing not only tourists, but also continuous fl ows of new immigrants who relocated in the aftermath of empire and colonialism. While these areas of immigrant resettlement serve as gathering places for dispersed members of the Vietnamese community, spatial anonymity in these locations has para- doxically allowed for the proliferation and public display of the most visible signs of diasporic Vietnamese cultural production. In the form of glossy airbrushed posters, hypervisible images of diasporic Vietnamese entertain- ers cover storefront windows of Vietnamese-owned restaurants and ethnic businesses, advertising the latest concert/entertainment variety show com- ing to town. The ads contain collages of singers, dancers, and performers where female artists are scantily clad or provocatively posed in form-fi tting ix